Achilles Heel
by Enfleurage
Summary: Archangel’s alliances were shifting things. Airwolf in Hawke’s hands had met both their needs for a long time, but if Briggs found it more advantageous to recover the helicopter for whatever purpose, Hawke wasn’t entirely sure that Briggs wouldn’t do it
1. Chapter 1

Airwolf Fanfic - typical disclosures. I don't own them, I just take them out to play occasionally.

* * *

"I'm just saying. Landing an aircraft on the same spot, fourteen times in a row, doesn't constitute a stunt." 

"Don't forget sitting there while Paullina Prince got in and out of the helicopter over and over again," Caitlin said from behind his shoulder shouting slightly over the roar of the engines and the churning blades above.

Hawke sighed, shot a sidelong glance at his nominal boss, who shrugged.

"Man hires us for a stunt and pays for a stunt, he can call it whatever he wants," Santini said firmly. "A full day's pay for landing a chopper on the same two-foot mark ain't nothing to complain about, String."

"Fourteen times in a row," Hawke muttered as he adjusted the collective.

"Thomakoles got his shot. He's happy with us and he's not easy to please."

Fourteen times in a row to get a two-second shot of Paullina Prince exiting the helicopter. Yeah, that would count as something of a perfectionist, Hawke thought sourly. Definitely not his idea of flying.

"Hey, you didn't have to wear the wig," Caitlin complained. "You have any idea how hot it is with one of those things on?"

"Uh-oh."

Hawke turned his head sharply towards Santini, who grimaced and nodded towards the hangar.

"We got company."

Hawke regarded the white stretch Lincoln for a second and then the corner of his mouth twitched decidedly upward. Whatever job the Firm might have for them definitely beat the flying Thomakoles had planned for them tomorrow.

"Oh no you don't," Santini warned, all too familiar with that look. "We got a contract."

"You do," Hawke said.

"Do I have to remind you that movie stunts pay the bills?"

Hawke settled the helicopter in the LZ outside the hangar, unbuckled his harness and carefully shut her down, all the time watching the white Lincoln out of the corner of his eye. They weren't inside -- the hangar was locked up – so that meant they were waiting him out inside the car.

He grinned and started fussing with the controls, running system checks that weren't entirely necessary. He drew it out as long as possible, ignoring Santini's snort. Sure enough, as soon as he cracked the hatch door open a scant inch, the Lincoln's driver popped out, scurried around the car and opened the back door.

"The two of you are like eight-year olds," Santini complained as he carefully shut the port hatch.

A sleek long leg swung out of the back of the Lincoln, followed immediately by its mate, and then a swirl of white silk. Caitlin's scramble out of the back of the helicopter was not nearly the graceful event of Marella's emergence from the car.

"Sorry, he'll be just a moment." Marella nodded towards the car's interior. "He's on the phone."

"Guess he wins this one," Caitlin whispered and then bounced out of reach.

Marella had the most expressive set of eyes Hawke had ever seen. They sparkled, they danced, they eviscerated, they caressed, they reflected in their deep brown depths whatever emotion she felt, but only when she chose to show it. Right now, her eyes were shuttered, she was closed down and Hawke felt his mood swing back towards foul. He stuck his hands in the back pockets of his jeans and leaned back on his heels.

Briggs climbed out a minute later. From the tight set of his jaw, the Firm wasn't going to offer a pleasant alternative to movie flying. Briggs jerked his head towards the hangar and Hawke set off towards the building, not waiting for the contingent in white.

He waited, briefly, while Santini unlocked the doors, and then strode in, suddenly edgy. He waited until the rest of the group was inside and then glared at Briggs who'd stopped abruptly less than ten feet inside the hangar.

"I need to see Airwolf," Briggs said, flatly, unemotionally.

Hawke didn't like his tone; he bit back an automatic baiting retort and studied the other man. Based on the tension rolling off the two Firm officers, he decided upon a more cautious approach than came naturally.

"You going to tell me why?"

"Can you tell us where you were at approximately fourteen hundred hours today?" Marella asked.

Hawke's gaze swung to her and then back to Briggs, brow crinkling in puzzlement.

"Flying stunts for a movie at the Paramount Studio lot," Santini said loudly, coming to stand next to Hawke. "Why? What's this about?"

"All of you?"

Marella was disconcertingly intense. Her total stillness standing rigidly next to Briggs somehow intensified her penetrating stare.

"What happened?" Hawke asked, needing but not wanting to know. He felt the answer in the pit of his stomach, even before Briggs answered.

"Same thing that happened last week, only this time with a CHP helicopter."

"Now wait a second…."

Hawke interrupted Santini. "It buzzed them?"

Briggs shook his head slowly, almost imperceptibly, and Hawke felt acid rise in his throat. Archangel that grim was a rare and unwelcome sight.

"Blew the doors off, figuratively speaking," Marella said. "The CHP chopper came down hard. The pilot was a little banged up."

"It wasn't Airwolf," Hawke said, quickly, trying to force the acid back down to his stomach.

"Two separate occasions," Briggs said slowly, shifting his weight onto his right leg. "This time, the description is coming from a police officer."

"You really think someone would steal Airwolf so they can joyride and scare some weekend pilots and the Highway Patrol?" Hawke asked.

"No," Briggs answered. "But it doesn't matter what I think. I can explain away one freak incident as dentists sampling their own nitrous oxide." He blew out a breath of frustration. "A California Highway Patrol officer I can't explain away. And the description is detailed."

"What if I say no?"

He knew it was a defensive reaction, knew that it wouldn't help the situation, but couldn't quite stop himself.

"You're not helping," Briggs warned.

"There was nothing in the paper about those dentists." Hawke felt his hands clench into fists, shoved them into his jeans pockets to hide his obvious distress. "Tell me why I should think this isn't just a ploy to steal her back."

Briggs pushed his hand through his hair. Momentarily disheveled, it fell back perfectly into place.

"Of course it's an attempt to flush her out," he said . "The first time, I was able to bury the story, discredit the dentists. It's going to be harder to do that with the cop, not to mention that it's now a criminal investigation."

Hawke stepped back, waiting for the argument he knew was coming.

"I'm under orders to get her back, damn the consequences," Briggs said. "I need something to give Zeus, to buy some time to figure out who's behind this play."

"You just want to see her?" Hawke let his skepticism show.

"No," Briggs sighed. "I… we need to examine her, in her hiding spot, to determine whether or not she was involved in these two incidents."

Hawke scowled. "That's too simple."

"And I want to leave one of my people there to stand guard as a witness that Airwolf isn't used in any further incidents."

A number of answers crossed Hawke's mind. He went with his instinct. "No." Then he turned his back and walked away from Briggs and Marella.

"Hawke," Briggs called. "This isn't optional."

"The hell it isn't," Hawke said over his shoulder. "I said 'no,' Michael."

He walked into Santini's office and slammed the door, taking fierce satisfaction in the way it rattled in its frame.

Five, four, three, two …..

The door swung open again and Hawke was only surprised that it was Santini opening it, not Briggs.

"You want to tell me what's going on here?"

Stepping across the threshold into the office, Santini crossed his arms and leaned against the wall. He'd left the door open and Hawke could see Marella talking to Caitlin with an occasional glance in the direction of the office.

Hawke shrugged. "I don't know much more than you."

"Now why don't I believe you?" Grizzled eyebrows threatened to meet in the center of Santini's face.

"Let me enlighten you." Briggs stepped carefully around Santini, inserting himself into the discussion. "An aircraft with the same distinctive markings and profile of Airwolf has encroached upon and damn near assaulted two other helicopters in the past two weeks." His eyebrows rose. "In broad daylight."

Santini's eyes flicked between Hawke's simmering anger and Briggs' cagey stillness.

"I don't get it. Who's doing it? What's the point?"

Hawke could see Caitlin's head tilt, her forehead furrow as she listened to whatever Marella was telling her, just outside his hearing range. The Firm was splitting its attack.

"Habeas Corpus," Briggs answered, leaning up against Santini's desk.

Hawke rolled his eyes "She's hardly in jail, Michael." He turned to Dominic. "They can't prove it wasn't Airwolf because they don't have control over her."

Santini was nodding. "So we're supposed to give the Lady back to the Firm to prove she had nothing to do with these attacks?" His scowl announced his opinion of that idea.

"We built her. The Feds are holding us liable," Briggs said. "You know, of course, that in the event that the Firm did regain control…."

"The attacks would stop."

Briggs nodded. "Which would get the Feds off our back, but the Firm wouldn't hold onto Airwolf more than forty-eight hours after this series of public embarrassments. We're not behind this."

"But you're supposed to get her back anyway?"

Briggs exhaled slowly. "I think I can buy us some time if I can prove that she's secure."

"You're not leaving someone in the Lair."

"How about you try working with me for a change?" Briggs said, exasperated. "I'm not trying to steal her away from you."

"I am working with you." Hawke said, vibrating with anger. "I'm keeping my half of the deal. You find St. John and then you get her back."

Briggs pinched the bridge of his nose and closed his eye for a moment. "I can't prove that it wasn't Airwolf because I don't have control over her, but more immediately, I can't even prove that _you_ have control or possession of Airwolf."

Hawke shrugged. "So I'll take you to see her."

He could see Briggs evaluating the offer, considering what he could reasonably expect to achieve against what he'd been charged to do.

"We go now."

Challenge and concession in the same three words. Hawke nodded, wondering as he did so what Briggs planned to spring on him once they were at the Lair.

Briggs sent Marella back to the car; she returned quickly with his briefcase while Santini checked the fuel gauge in the Jet Ranger. Hawke scrounged around the hangar looking for material that would serve as blindfolds for the two Firm officers, found an old, faded black tee shirt and ripped it apart at the seams. Acid roiled within his stomach. He knew with a certainty born not of logic but of instinct that Airwolf lay waiting in her Lair, that she wasn't the helicopter used to bait the Firm into responding, but one corner of his mind asked the question he refused to consider. _What if she was gone?_

"I hope that tee shirt was clean," Marella murmured as Hawke tied it around her face.

Sitting in the cabin of the Jet Ranger, Briggs and Marella looked uncomfortable, as if they were held against their will, or at least their better judgment. Marella sat on Briggs' left and she pushed up against him until their shoulders touched. Hawke grimaced; he'd forgotten for a moment how much complete loss of sight, even temporarily, upset Archangel, not that he'd ever admit it. Hawke knew only by the carefully controlled breaths the other man took when, for one reason or another, he couldn't see.

Hawke swallowed down the rage that still festered, had never completely died. Moffet was dead at Hawke's own hand, the aircraft he'd designed turned against him, the Firm's investment paying off in the coordinated deployment of automated and frighteningly effective systems of death. But Moffet's death was small recompense for the harm that sociopath had committed in pursuit of his own desires. Briggs' partial blindness was only a small piece of the assessed damage.

"Sit tight," he said, confident in his passengers' ability to adjust.

Hawke flew a very indirect route to the Lair, deliberately flying twenty minutes out of his way to throw off any attempt by the Firm officers to calculate a range between Van Nuys Airport and Airwolf's hiding place. If he'd had sufficient fuel, he would have flown halfway to Mexico. He settled for following the flight plan he'd filed for a route to San Diego before turning back.

Heart in his throat, he landed outside the Lair. He helped the still blindfolded Firm officers out of the helicopter and inside the echoing cavern whose open chimney allowed Airwolf to descend into and ascend from what appeared to be a solid rock formation from the outside. He didn't realize he'd been holding his breath until the sight of her sitting in the streaming light from the chimney took it away.

"As beautiful as the fresh blush of a young girl's smile," Santini said, almost reverently as they entered the cavern.

"A poet, Dominic?" Marella said, looking blindly around as she tried to place him by hearing alone.

"All men in love are poets," Briggs said, a smile curving his moustache.

"She is a lovely Lady, indeed," Santini agreed.

"If you don't mind your ladies with a fine coat of dust," Hawke countered.

He heard Briggs' sigh of relief. Apparently he hadn't been the only one keeping the panic at bay at the thought that it was just possible that it had actually been Airwolf engaged in the public taunting of the US government, and in particular, its Intelligence Agencies.

"Don't touch it," Briggs barked.

"Wasn't planning to," Hawke said, amused at Briggs' immediate assumption of authority.

"Can I….?" Briggs raised a hand to the black cotton material covering his upper face.

In three quick strides, Hawke was beside him, untying the blindfold and tucking it into his own pocket for reuse on the journey home. Santini was trying to do the same for Marella, fending off complaints about what the blindfold had done to her hair.

Briggs rubbed his face, squinting into the light. "My briefcase?"

Grumbling, Hawke headed back to the helicopter outside. As he returned, he saw Marella and Briggs squatting next to Airwolf's forward landing gear, Briggs pointing at something in particular and looking pleased. Hawke dropped the briefcase a few feet away and Marella immediately retrieved it.

Hawke stepped back, settled against a rock next to Santini and watched with tolerant amusement as Briggs and Marella got their white suits dirty taking photos of the dust on Airwolf's wing, the way the dirt was settled around her landing gear, and more than a few photos of her gauges, especially the fuel gauge.

"That's enough," Hawke said suddenly into the muted silence.

Inside the cabin, Briggs looked up in surprise, gaze shifting from Hawke to Marella, his eye lighting with understanding.

Marella lowered the camera, shrugged. "I just wanted to get a photo of the entire aircraft."

"You wanted a photo of the background of the cavern," Hawke corrected.

Marella sighed. "There's no backdrop, Hawke. I can't take a picture of Airwolf without getting some background in the picture."

"I see trust is still an issue," Briggs said as he climbed out of the flight deck.

Hawke studied him, gaze looking past the dust-smeared white suit and resigned expression to the calculating man underneath.

"You're planning on leaving something here, aren't you?"

Briggs' smile was a slight thing, just a twitch at the corner of his mouth.

"That's why I prefer having you on my side," he declared. "But I wouldn't leave anything without discussing it with you first."

Hawke had his doubts about that. "Uh-huh."

Briggs nodded to Marella who retrieved a small bit of electronics from Briggs' briefcase. Hawke studied it dispassionately. No bigger than a travel alarm clock, it looked relatively innocuous. Considering the source, Hawke knew it was anything but.

"What's it do?" Santini asked, rotating the object cautiously in his hand.

"Properly installed," Briggs said, reaching for the device, "it prevents any unauthorized parties from starting either engine of the helicopter."

Hawke took it out of Briggs' hands and looked at it more closely. "No way, Michael."

Briggs looked surprised. "I would have thought you would want some means of securing her."

"She's plenty secure right now. No one knows where she is and I plan to keep it that way," Hawke replied. Scowling at the small black box, he handed it back to Briggs. "You can keep your locator device, or whatever it is."

Briggs pushed it back at him. "Keep it. Take it apart. Do whatever it takes to convince yourself that it's not what you think. Just give me some means of guaranteeing that Airwolf isn't going to fall into the wrong hands."

"Not with one of your toys."

"Then pull a circuit board," Marella urged. "Something we can use to show that she's inoperative."

Hawke paused. If this was an act, it was a lot more convincing than any he'd seen from either of them in the past.

"We're done here," he decided.

"Hawke…" a chorus of voices protested.

"I said we're done," Hawke growled. "If I pull a circuit board, I won't do it in front of you so that you know which one it is and I sure as hell won't give it to you."

Briggs stared at him, a hard, unwavering stare that Hawke met without flinching. Briggs shook his head.

"You stubborn son-of-a-bitch. You're not giving me enough to convince my own mother that Airwolf isn't a threat, much less the Committee."

Hawke shrugged. Though he'd rather live in the center of Los Angeles than admit it, he was pretty sure Briggs could convince the Committee that the Earth rotated around the moon when he was truly motivated. And he was truly motivated right now.

"You took a lot of pictures. Convince them with that."

Briggs turned away in disgust and walked around the other side of Airwolf. Marella turned on Hawke.

"You know we haven't really looked for Airwolf up until this point," she said rhetorically. "If you force our hand, we'll pull out all the stops…"

"And hand her over to the DOD hours after you find her," Hawke concluded.

"Then we both lose," Marella said, brown eyes seething with frustration.

"Then we both lose," Hawke agreed. "Hope you're a good photographer."


	2. Chapter 2

"You don't trust them."

Hawke looked up from studying the tiny piece of micro circuitry on the desk in front of him. He was afraid to move, cough, sneeze for fear of it vanishing before he uncovered its secrets.

"Hell, no. You do?"

That would be a seismic shift of the size of plate tectonics if Dominic started trusting the Firm.

Santini shook his head. "No, it's just…." He trailed off, waved a hand as if that would explain.

Hawke nodded. He felt it too, that sense of unformed panic that Briggs and Marella had done their best to hide, conveying only a sense of urgency and frustration.

"We only have their word that this phantom helicopter even exists," Hawke pointed out. "No mention in the newspapers…"

"Or on the grapevine," Caitlin interjected. "I've talked to every cop I know, a few of them Highway Patrol and no one said a word. And cops _talk_."

"Of course, if they really thought it was Airwolf," Santini said, "suddenly it's National Security, code word clearance blah, blah, blah, and nothing ever happened."

Hawke shrugged, still focused on the tiny circuit board under the magnifying glass. He turned it with a set of tweezers that Caitlin scrounged from a First Aid Kit.

"No transmit or receive," he decided finally.

Caitlin knelt next to the desk, getting a closer look. "So it's not transmitting location?"

"Nope."

He'd have to give that one to Briggs.

"So what's it do?" Santini demanded, less patient that Caitlin.

"No idea," Hawke said softly, studying the chip. "Might do exactly what Archangel said it'd do."

Santini snorted. "Next you'll tell me that he's really on our side."

Hawke sighed. He and Briggs might usually be on the same side, but Archangel's alliances were shifting things. Airwolf in Hawke's hands had met both their needs for a long time, but if Briggs found it more advantageous to recover the helicopter for whatever purpose, Hawke wasn't entirely sure that Briggs wouldn't do so, their agreement be damned. It was business for Archangel – 'nothing personal,' he'd said, more than once – but it was damn personal for Hawke.

Fine strands of red gold hair hung in front of Caitlin's eyes and Hawke was tempted to brush them back. She turned clear blue eyes on him suddenly and he started.

"Did you pull a circuit board?"

"What?" Hawke blinked, came back to himself. "No. Disabling Airwolf isn't going to help matters any."

Caitlin tilted her head, looked at him thoughtfully. "Seems to me that whoever is behind this thing is watching the Firm."

"Yeah, watching them run around like the fox is in the hen house," Santini cackled.

"And it stands to reason that that they might quit if Archangel could prove that it's definitely not Airwolf."

"Pull a card now and it doesn't prove a thing about what's already happened," Hawke countered. "Besides, most of her circuitry could be replaced."

"But you've got a good point about them watching how the Firm reacts," Santini said.

"Assuming it's not an inside job," Hawke grumbled.

"But you don't think it's Archangel, do you?" Caitlin tilted her head, puzzled. "Why?"

Hawke shook his head. It just didn't _feel_ like one of Archangel's plots. Complex as those could be, this seemed unnecessarily complex. If Briggs really wanted her back, he had any number of simpler options, including installing a tracking mechanism in any of the Santini Air helicopters or setting up a fake mission.

"I don't know," he answered honestly. "I don't think he wants Airwolf back, not yet."

What he did know was that Briggs was pretty possessive about Airwolf, didn't want it outside Firm 'control' and had proven himself willing to go to the wall to maintain the status quo. The Committee had ordered Archangel to recover Airwolf and then had turned a blind eye to his apparent inability to execute those orders. The orders were on record, the Firm reaped the benefit of Airwolf missions, Briggs took all the political risks and everyone was happy. If Bogard couldn't wrestle Airwolf away from the Firm with Senate subcommittee hearings and satellite photos, Briggs could probably keep the Committee on his side through this latest challenge. In the short run, anyway.

"So what now?"

Still studying the microelectronics, Hawke shrugged. "I don't know what this does." He carefully reassembled the object. "But it doesn't really matter all that much."

"What?"

"Why?

The questions came almost simultaneously and Hawke almost smiled, would have if his mood wasn't suddenly so grim.

"This is what Michael let me see."

Santini was the first to get his meaning. "You mean that sneaky bastard left something else in the Lair? After all that baloney about not leaving anything without discussing it with you first?"

Caitlin looked disappointed, which surprised Hawke a little. He wondered what Marella had told her. Probably that they were the good guys because they wore the white hats, or at least the white suits, or some other bit of public relations nonsense.

Hawke shrugged. "I'd have probably done the same thing."

Except he might not have brought something extra to use as a decoy. Archangel was a lot more practiced in planned deceit.

"Well, what are we doing here?" Santini stood, grabbed his jacket. "You're not going to let him get away with it, are you?"

Hawke pushed back from the desk.

"Nope. But it's getting late." He nodded at the hangar window; darkness had started settling on the summer evening while he'd been examining the red herring Briggs had provided. "I'll go check it out. Probably camp there tonight."

Santini's eyebrows popped up.

"Just in case."

"Oh no, not by yourself, you're not."

"I'll go with you," Caitlin offered suddenly. "I haven't been camping in ages. I wouldn't mind listening to nothing for a night instead of traffic and sirens and stuff."

Santini scratched the back of his neck, scowled, considering.

"I don't need a babysitter," Hawke insisted.

"We have Thomakoles tomorrow at eight," Santini said, still doubtful.

"I'm ready to go now," Hawke said, with a glance in Caitlin's direction, hoping that not allowing her time to gather camping supplies would put her off.

She grinned. "Oh, I've got a travel bag in my car. I'll just grab it and I'm ready to go, too."

Damn. That didn't work as he'd thought it would. But company wouldn't hurt; they could take shifts staying awake, just in case Hawke was misreading Archangel's motives.

"All right," he said, begrudgingly, not willing to acknowledge that the company might be tolerable much less desired.

Her smile lit up the hangar and wore away at his resolve. Then she turned and loped towards her car, as if she sensed how itchy Hawke was to get moving.

"You'll call me?" Santini demanded. "And you'll be back here at seven tomorrow morning, ready to go?"

Hawke wasn't sure which of the two worried Dominic the most: the risk to Airwolf or the risk of not complying with the contract to the movie studio.

"Yup."

If he had to be stuck with a babysitter, Caitlin was the quieter of the two options and for that, Hawke was grateful. Night flying in the Valley of the Gods was both lovely and occasionally dangerous; he liked having his concentration on the upcoming landscape, the looming monumental rocks, scattered as if the Gods had tossed rune stones of excessive size.

He'd even have to admit that Caitlin was good company, a soothing presence and someone with whom the silence was easy, not strained. He chanced a look in her direction, pretending to be scanning the horizon to his left, but she wasn't looking at him. She was staring out into the distance, off to her left, humming softly and Hawke was struck by an odd yet comforting feeling that this is what it felt like to be settled.

"Hawke?"

He turned to look at her again, this time in response and he could see the brightness of her eyes even in the dark of the cabin.

"Yeah?"

"If you don't think Michael wants Airwolf back, why d'you think he left some kind of tracking device in the Lair?"

He sighed, almost reluctant to return his mind to the business at hand. And it itched at him, the way Caitlin had switched back to Michael, from Archangel, as if she had sorted things out and decided that Briggs was still on their side, something he was not yet ready to concede.

"Just 'cause Archangel doesn't want her back doesn't mean that he doesn't want to know where she is."

He heard himself speak, noted with a little embarrassment his deliberate use of Briggs' code name in opposition to Caitlin's assumption of relative innocence.

Caitlin hmm'd, seemed satisfied for the moment.

They were almost to the Lair before she spoke again.

"Hawke?"

"Uh-huh."

This time he kept attention focused ahead, squinting into the dark for the landmarks he knew as well as he knew the route from Eagle Lake to Van Nuys Airport.

"If you figured out that Michael left something in the Lair, why didn't you take it when you were out here earlier or go back right away after he and Marella left?"

He grumbled a little under his breath.

"What?"

"Didn't occur to me then," he admitted, reluctantly.

"Oh." Caitlin sounded a little surprised, having obviously granted him credit for some amazing insight into Firm behavior. "Okay then."

He was grateful she let it drop without further comment. He should have known. It wasn't until he was unable to determine the purpose of Briggs' gadget that it dawned on him that its true purpose was as a decoy; its internal mechanisms were sufficiently convincing to persuade that it did something without any clear indication of what that something was. Either Briggs didn't think Hawke would really take the gadget apart or he didn't care if Hawke did and it was the latter that had Hawke worried.

Approaching the Lair, he activated the Jet Ranger's spotlight and flew a 360-degree survey of the rock formation, looking intently for tracks or skid marks in the dirt. Not seeing anything amiss, he landed just around and behind the entrance. In the night, there wasn't much chance being spotted but he was reluctant to break with habit.

He followed Caitlin towards the Lair, retracing his steps from earlier. Caitlin tossed her gear bag just in front of the nose of the helicopter and twisted her head to and fro, scanning the interior of the Lair.

"Where do we start?"

Hawke had already opened the pilot's side hatch. "Michael was inside her for a while, supposedly taking pictures."

While Marella was distracting him outside, taking photos of Airwolf's exterior. She'd distracted him all right. The thought that she was trying to get evidence to help the Firm determine Airwolf's location had completely occupied his interest; he'd paid little attention to Briggs. In fact, he couldn't even remember whether or not Briggs had a camera when he climbed out of Airwolf.

"God damn you, Michael," Hawke growled as he sat in the pilot's seat and studied the instrument panel, looking for something out of place, something, anything, that he hadn't seen hundreds of times in the past when he'd sat in the same position.

Caitlin's voice trickled up from the engineer's position. "You'd like to trust him, wouldn't you?"

"Not a chance," Hawke said immediately.

Airspeed indicator, good. Vertical speed indicator, good. Manifold Pressure gauge, good. Torque percent gauge, good. Engine Rotor RPM gauge, good. Gas Producer, good. Carburetor Heat, good. Fuel Quantity, good. Load Fuel, good. Engine Oil, good. Turbine Temperature Out1, good, same for Out2. Warning panel, good. Engine panel, good. Altimeter, heading, attitude, turn, ADF coordinator, VOR1, VOR 2 indicators, all good.

Hawke swore under his breath, pulled the circuit breakers. Then he lay on his stomach and checked under the tail rotor pedals for both pilot and co-pilot, though he doubted Briggs, a pilot himself, would have done anything that might impede a pilot's control of the aircraft. Then he pulled the servos driving the altimeter, heading indicator and ADF. Still nothing.

He ran a flashlight beam under the instrument panel, and then to check his eyesight, he ran his fingertips across the entire underside of the panel.

Nothing on the transponder or the radio. Nothing on the collective, nothing on the cyclic. Nothing on either of the pilots' seats, the hatch doors, the interior ceiling, or deck.

It was small enough that Hawke almost missed it when he was running his fingers over the back of the wet compass. It was about the size of a small box of wooden matches and aligned neatly against the back of the compass. Detaching the intruder carefully, Hawke held it up to the interior overhead light for a more thorough perusal.

"Got it," he said, with no small degree of satisfaction.

"Me, too," Caitlin echoed grimly.

Hawke felt his eyebrows shoot upward. He'd expected Briggs to plant one device, he hadn't thought even that crafty bastard had time for more than that. He held up his small, black matchbox-sized device.

"Back of the compass."

"In the overhead compartment, behind the first aid kit," Caitlin said, holding up a slightly larger device, maybe three inches long, half an inch thick. "Think there's any more?"

Hawke felt a wave of depression roll over him. He would have thought after one, he could stop looking.

"Probably." He sighed. "Shit."

* * *

"Damn," Briggs said softly, but with real feeling as he watched the indicator light flicker and then go out.

Only the desk lamp in his office was lit, leaving the rest of the room dark enough that even the faintest glimmer of light would show clearly on the instrument panel. There had been two steady lights. Only one remained.

"Which one did he find?"

Marella's voice floated out of the darkness. Briggs could identify her as a pale blur somewhere on the other side of his desk but he'd been studying paperwork under the desk lamp long enough that his night vision wasn't yet engaged.

"The transceiver," Briggs said. "It was attached behind the compass."

"Out in the open?" Marella sounded surprised. "I would have thought you'd have hidden it somewhere less obvious.

"You'd be surprised at how often objects in the open are overlooked."

He refrained from mentioning that had she distracted Hawke for a longer period, he might have had the time to conceal the transceiver somewhere less obvious.

"How many did you place?"

"Three, including my old pager, which I packed with sufficient circuitry to keep Hawke occupied for a day or so trying to analyze it."

Marella's chuckle filled the empty space between them. "Very devious. How did you know he'd go back to look?"

"I'd hoped the decoy would keep him busy until tomorrow, actually," Briggs admitted. "But it was inevitable that he'd become suspicious, especially when he realized that the decoy was just that."

"He doesn't trust us, does he?"

"Hawke may be something of an idealist, but he's not a fool."

He heard rather than saw her move towards his desk, was still somewhat startled when she perched on the corner nearest him. Her warm smile didn't hide the shrewd assessing look in her eyes.

"If you tell the Committee you have Airwolf's location, they're going to want us to recover her."

It was said as a statement, but meant as a question.

"I don't have Airwolf's location."

A perfectly waxed eyebrow crooked over a skeptical brown eye.

"By the time I meet with the Committee," Briggs glanced at his watch and sighed, "I won't have Airwolf's location anymore."

"So the transceiver and the other devices?"

He shrugged. "Hawke's already found the transceiver and disabled it. My pager is just another decoy, albeit it a bit more sophisticated than that old computer card you provided. Neither will give me, or the Committee, Airwolf's location."

Marella no longer looked skeptical, she looked worried.

"You're leaving in less than an hour and you don't have anything to give them besides the photos?" She snapped her fingers. "What about the third device? You said you planted three."

Briggs shook his head. "I only planted two in Airwolf."

"You said three," Marella insisted. "Three, including your old pager."

He smiled. An excellent memory was a requirement in an intelligence officer and Marella's memory was razor sharp, sometimes sharper than his.

"I placed three devices," he replied steadily. "I only planted two in Airwolf."

Marella sat back, surprised and a little chary. He could see her running the options in her mind, assessing and rejecting them one by one.

"Where then?"

He pushed out of his chair and headed towards the en suite bathroom. His secretary had already packed one of the two spare suits he kept in his office, along with his travel shaving kit. He had just enough time for a shower and a fresh shave before the night flight to D.C., a necessary evil to arrive in time for his command performance before the Committee the next morning.

"Doesn't matter," he said to Marella, who kept pace beside him. "Hawke won't find it, but he'll keep looking. And as long as he's looking, either he or Dominic or Caitlin will be in the Lair."

"And you get your guard on Airwolf," she said, with an admiring smile.

Briggs tugged at his tie, unloosened the knot and pulled it from around his neck, tossing it into the basket set aside to collect dry cleaning. He started to unbutton his shirt and then stopped, giving Marella a questioning look. She was lingering for a reason.

She picked up the heavy white silk tie from the basket and smoothed it, before meeting his gaze.

"Are you sure you don't want company on this trip?"

He'd thought so. She was easy to read. Even when she adopted her most impassive face, he could read her more easily than he could determine his own emotions or motivations. On the other hand, he had to admit that she gave him unrestricted access.

"You know that I don't like an audience when I'm getting my head handed to me," he said, a little more peevishly than he'd intended.

She flinched and he felt a surge of guilt.

"I'm sorry. That didn't come out as I intended."

He was nervous, he wasn't happily anticipating this trip, and he had less than eight hours to come up with a convincing argument for the members of the Committee, most of whom would happily strip him of the Airwolf project, not to mention his other various responsibilities and possibly his position.

Marella took a deep breath. "I simply meant, that if you go there without any staff, it will seem odd. A Deputy Director doesn't travel without support. Maybe for a meeting within the complex, but not for a trip cross-country."

He paused, gave it some thought and let his expression show that he was listening to her, that he was giving this thought. He owed her that, at the very least.

"I prefer traveling with you," he said, slowly, thoughtfully, telling her nothing that she didn't already know but based on the flush in her cheeks, information that would always be welcome and in this case, well-timed. "But I need you here, to run down this faux Airwolf, not tied up in D.C."

Marella nodded, agreeing, possibly already ahead of him.

"You're right. I can keep the investigation on track more effectively here than I can if I'm in the air or in meetings. But you shouldn't go alone. It'll seem as if you're expecting to get dressed down."

Briggs frowned. He hadn't thought of it that way, still didn't like the idea of one of his aides anywhere near the ass-kicking he was expecting to receive. But it would be beneficial to have someone listening into the gossip of the other assistants waiting for the Committee members and senior officers who'd be inside the meeting with him.

"It's a bit short notice to ask anyone to go," he said finally.

Marella's smile indicated that she was pleased with him. "I'll take care of it while you shower."

In a swirl of white, she left him in the doorway of the bathroom. As he unbuttoned his shirt, he wondered how on earth he'd function without her.


	3. Chapter 3

"You know this is just Redwolf all over again," Santini said. "Next you know they'll be framing us for something we didn't do."

Half of flying stunts for movies was sitting around and waiting for the stunt coordinator or the director to tell you they were ready for you. Maybe more than half. Hawke was sprawled in a folding canvas chair, feet up on a nearby crate, sunglasses slid just far enough down his nose that he could look over the tops when he wanted.

"It's all about who 'they' are, Dom," Hawke said. "And Jenkins didn't use an Airwolf clone to frame us."

Normally, he'd be fighting a losing battle against boredom and frustration. This time, he was trying not to worry about Airwolf; he'd hated leaving the Lair that morning after a fitful night trying to sleep. Lack of sleep and the warm California sunshine was adding drowsiness to worry.

"Last time, 'they' was the Firm," Santini said, glowering. "Despite what the Ice Cream man thought."

"Yeah."

Hawke hadn't shaken the depression that had settled over him the previous night in the Lair. Despite not finding any other extraneous Firm hardware or anything even remotely suspicious in Airwolf or the Lair, he wasn't inclined to drop his guard. Hell, maybe that was what Archangel wanted: Hawke on high alert. The man could've just asked.

"You should have dropped those gadgets in a dumpster or run over them with one of her wheels."

Hawke smiled despite himself, at the image of Archangel's immaculately attired minions climbing through a garbage dumpster.

"Denny's taking a look at them," he said.

"Denny Coyle?" That was enough to make Santini sit up from his near reclining position inside the stunt copter's flight deck. He whistled long and low. "You figure on getting some use out of them yourself? In the future?"

"Maybe."

The thought hadn't occurred to Hawke. He really just wanted to know what they did. If the matchbox-sized black box and Caitlin's slightly larger black box proved to be decoys, he'd have to keep looking, or maybe just conclude that Archangel wanted him to keep looking. Either way, Denny would be able to tell him within a day or so.

"Who's Denny Coyle?"

Hawke had smelled the tantalizing aroma of coffee but the sight of Caitlin holding a tray with three cups was an unexpected pleasure.

"Whoa!" Caitlin put the tray down on the crate Hawke was using as a footrest, casually pushing his feet off the box. "Was that an actual smile? Couldn't be."

Santini laughed and reached for one of the paper cups. "Hawke smile? You must have seen a weather balloon or something 'cause there ain't no such thing as a UFO."

Hawke just shook his head and took the coffee that Caitlin offered him.

"So who's Denny Coyle?" she asked again, after seating herself atop Hawke's crate.

"Retired Navy radioman," Hawke answered.

"He's one of them savants or something with electronic things," Santini said, rolling his eyes at his partner's reticence. "He can take things apart, figure out what they do and put them back together in a way to do something completely different, or better than they were in the first place."

Caitlin's blue eyes were almost hidden in the scrunched up face she gave when she was a little worried. "You sure those things we found weren't classified or something?"

"Denny doesn't talk much, and he doesn't talk to strangers. Kind of a good habit," Hawke said with a deliberate glance at Santini.

"Don't spill the coffee on your uniforms. Hodges says we'll be ready to go in about 30 minutes," Santini said suddenly, holding one hand tightly against the headset he wore.

Hawke regarded the Hollywood version of a police officer's uniform that he and Caitlin wore, detailed down to nametags, LVPD patches on the shoulders, and a belt and holster. All for the infinitesimal chance either of them would actually be visible in the shot. Santini was in his normal Santini Air garb, bright blue jacket and all, which was further proof of an unjust universe.

"So, an hour?" Caitlin drawled.

"More or less," Hawke agreed, stretching his legs and sliding them onto the crate on a corner away from where Caitlin perched.

Caitlin glanced around. The benefit of hanging around the stunt copter was that it was removed from the location shooting, meaning the movie crew, cameras, lights and all of the milling crowds were several hundred yards away. Of course, so were the catering trucks, but she didn't mind stretching her legs to get coffee or a sandwich. There was little else to do while waiting.

"So what's up with this Airwolf wannabe?"

Hawke shrugged. "What did Marella tell you yesterday?"

He'd meant to ask her that last night but the search had taken longer than either of them had expected and they both needed some sleep for an early day of waiting, and waiting some more on the movie set.

Caitlin straightened, blinked a few times as if consciously recalling the conversation.

"Well, she said that someone was flying a helicopter with the same markings and a similar fuselage as Airwolf, and that whoever was flying it was provocatively intruding on the airspace of other helicopters in way designed to get noticed."

"Provocatively intruding on their airspace?" Hawke felt one corner of his mouth creep up. "Nice description."

"Thanks, but it was Marella's. She said it had happened twice, but they were worried that whoever it was might be escalating and that if it happened again, someone might get hurt."

It was pretty much the same information with a slightly different flavor. Apparently Marella was more willing to share their concerns while her boss was focused on getting something he could use politically.

"She say anything about why this someone might be doing this?" Santini asked.

"No. Only that it seemed designed to pressure the Firm to recover Airwolf."

Briggs had said as much, but….

"They're supposed to be trying to do that anyway, so why the sudden pressure?"

Caitlin shook her head. "She didn't say. I don't think they know."

And Briggs said it wasn't the Firm, that the Firm knew they'd lose control if they did recover Airwolf, which only meant that it could be anyone, including a rogue Firm officer but it probably, only _probably_, wasn't officially sanctioned by the Committee.

"So what are we supposed to do?" Santini said.

"Damned if I know," Hawke grumbled.

"There was a week in between incidents, right?" Caitlin asked, leaning forward over her knees, excitement shining in her blue eyes. "And the second incident was yesterday, so they stick to the same schedule, we've got almost a week to figure it out."

"_We_?" Santini demanded, his voice rising in outrage. "We have a business to run, clients to make happy, money to make. We don't need to be haring off after what's probably a political battle between the White Wonder and some other office of misinformation."

Caitlin huffed a little and sat back, surprised and maybe a little offended.

Hawke sighed heavily, swinging his booted feet to the ground, and then placed his coffee next to them.

"They're after Airwolf. That makes it my business," he said grimly.

Santini threw his hands up in the air. He could argue but Hawke's tone of voice made it clear that Hawke and Caitlin would investigate, no matter what he said.

"Paint a Bell 222 the right color combination and you're halfway there."

It was a grudging offer of support but Hawke took it for the good will that Santini had intended and gave him a half-smile.

"We track down everyone who owns a 222?" Caitlin asked, voice and expression a little incredulous at the scope. "You do remember that it's a week. Less than a week, actually."

"No," Hawke said. "I'd bet that Archangel's already got people doing that. Tracking down any and all Bells and identifying anyone who could modify one to make it look more like Airwolf.."

"More than Michael's people looking," Caitlin interjected. "CHP going to cover that same ground."

"Why the dentists?"

Caitlin shrugged. "They're professionals. It's not like we'd ever admit it, but cops do tend to evaluate who is making the report. Are they an upstanding member of the community? Any history of false reports? Possibly under the influence? Trying to come up with an excuse to satisfy the insurance company to claim damages? Broad daylight certainly supports that they saw something close to what they reported."

Hawke noted the inclusive 'we,' but chose not to say anything. Maybe it was wearing the uniform that did it.

"So the dentists get buzzed and they're supposedly upstanding members of the community. Who do they bitch to? Besides the cops?"

"Most pilots would look for the tail numbers, file a complaint with the local Flight Standards Office," Santini answered.

Hawke was thinking the same thing and trying to remember what he'd heard from Archangel. Same markings, same profile.

"Marella didn't mention tail numbers," Caitlin said.

"Yeah," Hawke said. "Neither did Michael."

Santini drew his eyebrows down to one grizzled line over his eyes.

"Maybe the dentists don't look for FAA registration numbers but the cop sure would."

"Yeah." Hawke rubbed his chin. "We got time enough for me to make a call?"

Santini sighed, loudly, and then in case he hadn't made his point, he twisted his wrist to look at his watch.

"Yeah, I'll hurry," Hawke said.

Finding a phone, available to a lowly stunt pilot and private enough for the type of conversation he needed to have was more of an obstacle and Hawke was conscious of Santini in the background, tapping the face of his wristwatch.

He settled for a payphone, dropped a quarter in and punched in the number he knew by heart, one he wouldn't find in any phone directory.

"Operations, how may I help you?"

Hawke tried to remember the name of Briggs' secretary. Victoria, Virginia, Violet, something with a V and a smooth, polished voice. Hell…

"Stringfellow Hawke calling for Archangel."

"I'm afraid he is unavailable, Mr. Hawke. Would you care to leave a message?"

Hawke grimaced. If Archangel wanted to talk to Hawke, his staff would find him. Apparently pissing off Briggs got you taken off his 'put him through' list.

"What about Marella? She available?"

"Just a moment, Mr. Hawke."

No annoying on hold music with the Firm, just peaceful silence that stretched out long enough to allow time to trace the call or to trigger any necessary recording device.

"Hawke?"

Marella. Polite, cautious and curious all packed into the same word. He knew he should let it go but it wasn't in his nature to take even a minor slight without response.

"Michael not taking my calls anymore?"

The sound she made was somewhere between a snort and an annoyed exhalation.

"Don't be ridiculous. He's in Washington. What do you want?"

It was embarrassing how that small piece of news made him feel better.

"You said this bird had the same paint job, same bone structure, right?"

"Yes?"

He cupped the bottom of the phone receiver, old habits coming to the fore despite the negligible chance that anyone would care what he was saying much less lip-read him.

"What about tail numbers?"

"Just N31. Nothing else."

"Damn." Airwolf's registration number was N3176S, even if it wasn't painted on her tail boom. "How'd they know her numbers?"

He shot a glance towards the stunt copter in the distance. Santini was pacing but wasn't glaring in his direction. Yet.

"We're not sure they do," Marella conceded. "The CHP officer got a clear look at the helicopter. He should have seen the whole tail number."

"And he didn't." Hawke exhaled into the receiver. "Smudged or only partially painted?"

"The officer thought it was worn away or covered. Whomever is attempting to pass this helicopter as Airwolf apparently only knows the first three digits of her tail number."

"Damn," Hawke said softly. "Guess you're not into sharing everything, huh?"

"That wasn't a particularly relevant fact to whether or not the actual Airwolf was secure." She paused. "I don't suppose you've re-thought your position on having her guarded?

Hawke smiled tightly. "Why? Didn't you leave enough toys to track her position?"

"Just enough to convince you that we're serious."

That stopped him for a minute. He'd been expecting denial. An admission meant that they already knew he'd found the devices, which meant that at least one had been transmitting. He swore, mentally, and fought an immediate urge to hang up the phone and hightail it to the Lair.

If Archangel knew the Lair's location, they could have recovered her last night. But they didn't. Why not?

"She's secure where she is," he said, warily.

"At present, yes."

That was what she said. What Hawke heard, what he was sure Marella' cheerful response deliberately implied was that if they had not agreed that Airwolf was secure, they would already have recovered her, or at least moved her.

His peripheral vision saw motion. Turning his head, he saw Santini frantically waving his arms and Caitlin already walking in his direction.

"I got work to do. You better figure out who's playing this game and soon."

He hung up the phone before she could respond.

"Hawke," Caitlin called. "We have to go. They're ready for us now."

He scowled at the phone, exhaled heavily and turned to go.

"Tell me we're done after today," he said.

He saw the apologetic twist to her lips, how she hesitated before replying and silently groaned. .

"Sorry," Caitlin said, sounding sympathetic. "But they're willing to pay overtime for us to work tomorrow and Sunday. Weekend rates. Dom couldn't turn them down."

Hawke groaned out loud, only slightly comforted by Caitlin's hand on his arm.

"Want something to groan about," she asked, half-laughing. "You wear the wig tomorrow and then you can groan."


	4. Chapter 4

Marella stretched languidly, consciousness emerging gradually into the dim light of morning, luxuriating in the delicious warm and deep comfort of her bedclothes. She sighed softly, pleasantly surprised to wake with a sense of comfort and wellbeing considering the stress of the current situation.

The light coming through the bedroom windows was dishwater dirty, rain thudded steadily against the skylight glass but the absolutely wonderful thing about Sunday mornings was the ability to turn over and sink into the decadence of a lazy morning at home. Marella tugged at the duvet, determined to burrow under it for at least another hour. Its resistence to her attempt to move it was a little odd and she squinted at it for a long minute before her sleepy brain registered the weight of arm holding it down.

She twisted around in place, surprised at the sight of Briggs' head on the other pillow. He was facing her, eyes presumably closed but with the right side of his face buried into the down pillow, impossible to know for sure were it not for the slow, sonorous breathing of deep sleep. She'd no idea when he'd come home; he must have been extraordinarily quiet to keep from waking her. Based on the fact that he hadn't woken when she'd shifted, he'd had little sleep in D.C. Marella longed to wake him, but settled for quietly lying inches from him and watching him sleep.

Which was entertaining for about ninety seconds.

Then she turned back onto her right side and shifted herself, in increments, back into spooning range. Pulling the duvet over her shoulders, she reached behind her, felt around until she located Briggs' hand and then draped his arm around her waist. Habit and instinct sleepily kicked in; his arm tightened, pulling her closer. Marella sighed happily and sunk back into the feathery comfort of her down pillow and the warmth of a loving embrace, her favorite way to spend a Sunday morning.

It was the phone that woke her the second time, her phone, not his, and she scowled at it while pushing herself to the side of the bed.

She cleared her throat once, then again, and answered, hoping it wasn't her mother. She wasn't in the mood for a long conversation. "Yes?"

"Hi, it's Laura. Did I wake you?"

Marella glanced at the clock on the bedside table before answering. Almost eleven. She couldn't remember the last time she'd slept that late. Check that. She'd never slept that late. At least not since college.

"No, of course not," she lied. She heard Briggs moving behind her. She glanced back; he was sitting up and rubbing the sleep from his face. "Not enough coffee, I guess. What's up?"

"What time did the boss have everyone coming in today?"

Laura was duty officer this weekend, so she'd been in at 8:00 AM sharp, maybe earlier. Marella could hear the suppressed eagerness in the other woman's voice. Laura had something.

"He wasn't specific," Marella said, with a fond glance at Briggs. "When I spoke to him last, he wasn't getting back until sometime this morning so I told everyone to be in at 1 PM. Why? What do you have?"

_When did you get home?_ she mouthed at Briggs. He smiled wearily and held up three fingers, frowned at his hand and then raised another finger, shrugging. A white suit jacket, trousers, and dress shirt tossed over the bench at the foot of the bed indicated he'd undressed quickly and without regard for his clothing.

"Ray Zinn," Laura answered.

Marella sat up. "What about him?" she said, trying to keep the sharpness out of her voice.

Briggs crawled across the bed to try to listen to the conversation.

"We can't find him," Laura said. "He's disappeared. No one's seen him in the last two weeks and he didn't give any notice at work or with his landlord. The local police are treating it as a missing persons case."

Marella frowned, mouthed '_Ray Zinn'_ at Briggs and tried to remember everything she knew about the man.

"Odd," she said finally. "Sounds unplanned, which raises a number of questions." She could hear in the charged silence that Laura was waiting for something more than that. "It's our first concrete bit of information. Good work." She smiled suddenly, realizing that her praise wasn't what the other woman really wanted. "You should brief Archangel yourself, though you might want to wait a little while before calling. His flight was delayed – thunderstorms in the Ohio valley – and he probably got in at an ungodly hour this morning."

Laura's laughter trickled through the phone line. "Oh, thanks. I get to brief him when he's had no sleep. Maybe I should wait until he comes into the office."

Marella grinned at Briggs who scowled back at her. "I'm sure he'll be happy to hear we're got something. Who do we have working Zinn?"

She listened as Laura gave the names, teams, organizations, briefing schedules, things they'd cover in even more detail later in the office. Her eyes followed Briggs as he headed towards the bathroom, wondering how on earth he'd found pajama bottoms at the time he'd arrived home, specifically how he'd found them without waking her.

Briggs exited the bathroom just as Marella was replacing the receiver in its cradle. Glasses on, she noticed, he's up for the day.

"Good morning," he said, smiling as he headed towards her.

He leaned down and kissed her, lips touching hers softly. She tasted toothpaste as her lips parted and the kiss deepened. Wrapping her arms around his neck, she pulled him back down to the bed. "Welcome home, baby."

"You're wearing my shirt," he said, each word a subtle exhalation of breath on skin that left her shivering. His lips moved down her neck to the base of her throat, lingering in the hollow between her collar bones.

"It's a poor substitute for the real thing," she whispered. And as terribly cliché as it was to sleep in one of his shirts, one of his _worn_ shirts, she slept more soundly that way when he was out of town.

"Ahhhhh." His attention, and his hands, shifted further south. "I'm going to have to ask you to remove it."

She laughed lightly. "Too many words, Michael."

"I missed you," he said as he began unbuttoning the shirt himself and then halted, looking up at her. "This would be where you tell me how much you missed me."

Running her hands down his spine, she leaned into him and nipped at the lobe of his ear. "I'd rather show you."

It was _his_ phone that woke her the third time. Tangled limbs and twisted sheets delayed Briggs's grab at the phone and it rang four times before he snagged the receiver.

"Yes?" he barked, irritation at the sheets still wrapped around his hips unfortunately redirected at the caller. "Yes. I mean, no. I'm awake. Go ahead."

Poor Laura, Marella thought as she untangled the sheets and crawled free of the bed. Their boss did sound unusually fierce when he'd just been woken. Despite the foreknowledge that Laura would be calling, they'd both drifted off after slow and lazy lovemaking, a perfect pace for a dreary gray Sunday. She found Briggs's glasses on the floor where they'd landed after he'd tried to put them on the nightstand, and handed them to him as he concentrated on Laura's briefing.

Shower, something to eat, and then to the office, she ticked off in her mind as she twisted the shower knobs to the temperature she preferred. She was rinsing shampoo from her hair when the shower door open and Briggs joined her.

"Anything new?" she asked, handing him the shampoo bottle.

"Ray Zinn," he said, thoughtfully, pouring an excessive amount of shampoo into his hand.

She winced as he, in a typically male move, used it to wash his hair, his face, his mustache, and the rest of his body. Fourteen dollars a bottle, she reminded herself. He's worth fourteen dollars a bottle. Most of the time.

"Ray Zinn isn't new," she said gently as she removed the shampoo bottle from anywhere near his vicinity. "Laura mentioned that when she called earlier." She kept the fifteen dollar bottle of conditoner out of his reach as well.

"Zinn has the motivation for it," Briggs said. "I'll even grant him the brains, but he doesn't have the capital or the organizational skills. And if we recover Airwolf, DOD will grab her and start mass production, which is not his goal."

Marella worked the conditioner through her curls, finger combing a few strands at a time as she mulled over his words.

"We're assuming the goal is for us to recover Airwolf. Whether that results in having to turn her over to DOD, or having her stolen, or even destroyed, is less clear."

"You're cheerful this morning," he complained. "Where's the conditioner? The water in DC was awful."

She poured an appropriate amount into one cupped palm and began massaging it through his hair, to appreciative sighs.

"Turn around," she ordered, pleased with his immediate compliance. "We're running down all purchases or thefts of Bell 222's or helicopters with a similar fuselage. We're tracking down all merchants selling the particular DuPont paint that was used for Airwolf, or a similar dark gray metallic. It doesn't have to match, just pass at a distance."

She pulled out the handheld showerhead and rinsed the conditioner from his bowed head, envious of how easily his hair fell into place. Hundred dollar haircuts will do that, she grumbled to herself.

"We've tracked down every aircraft mechanic with the skills to modify a helicopter to look like Airwolf. We've tracked down everyone who has ever worked at Red Star, even if it was in a maintenance position…"

"Zinn fits both categories," he interrupted, "and we don't know where he is."

"We know he's missing," she said. "In the meantime, our analysts are pouring through every piece if information, no matter how small, modeling every possible scenario, identifying anyone who would benefit from the Firm recovering Airwolf."

"Including our own people?" he asked, turning around to face her.

The grimness of his question stopped her recitation. She bought some time by rinsing out the remaining conditioner from her hair.

"How did it go with the Committee?"

The ample sigh and his exit from the shower stall was a pretty good indication of how it went. Damn, damn, damn, she thought as she finished up in the shower herself.

Briggs had wrapped a towel around his waist and was running hot water into the sink as he tested the sharpness of his safety razor with a thumb. His gaze followed her appreciatively in the mirror as she came out of the shower stall.

"That well, huh?" Marella said, reaching for a bath towel and wrapping it around her body.

"I told them that I have eleven very promising developmentals, an agent in Budapest under suspicion and possibly in need of extraction, six different operations including paramilitary training for those poor bastards who think they can overthrow Khaddafi, and a pressing need for multilingual case officers in the Middle East and Africa."

Marella grabbed another towel for her hair, began rubbing ferociously. "And?"

"And that painting a helicopter black and white and buzzing some other helicopter is nothing more than a distraction to take our eyes off what's important, namely whether or not certain of our allies have been so severly compromised in their intelligence infrastructure that we should reevaluate our policies. Not to mention that participating in this farce is playing into the hands of whomever is behind it."

Marella winced. She was sure _that_ went over well with the older members of the Committee who tended to have little appreciation what they perceived as Briggs's irreverance and blatant disregard for their wealth of experience.

"And?"

"I was reminded of the Firm's investment of money and resources into the Airwolf project and of the fact that these incidents bring renewed attention to our inability to recover the aircraft, not to mention unwelcome interest from local law enforcement and the media."

"Ouch."

Briggs had probably cleaned up the language and the tone used in the meetings but there was no mistaking that the Committee was not happy.

"I bought us a few days, no more. Another incident and it's time for a 'fresh approach to the Airwolf situation.'"

"Good God, who said that? Not Zeus?"

"No. Zeus clearly understands that reacting in any way is akin to giving them exactly what they want. Whoever they are." Briggs shook some of the shaving cream off the razor into the hot water. "Handing the investigation entirely over to the Bureau was discussed."

"The F.B.I?" She couldn't have been more shocked if Briggs had announced he was planning to recover Airwolf himself. "Tell me you're joking."

The scowl that she drew was more than clear indication of Briggs's opinion of the idea.

"Which of the Gods suggested that harebrained idea?"

Briggs smiled down at the sink. "They're not all code-named after Greek Gods, you know," he said, obviously trying not to laugh.

They'd covered this topic before but Marella was perversely amused by the Firm's cryptonymic naming conventions and how they varied by generation of officers. Briggs was of the Biblical generation, as was Vlad Rostoff, cryptonym Moses. Marella herself had the unfortunate timing of being recruited during the horicultural generation. Somewhere down the line, the Firm would be headed by someone named Camellia Japonica or Brassica Oleracea and they'd rethink the latitude given to Logistical Support.

"It was Thor, actually," Briggs said, wiping his chin clean with a washcloth. "The 'fresh approach' comment, not the FBI suggestion. That came from the jackass in Science and Technology."

The twin positions of Deputy Director, Operations and Deputy Director, Intelligence were traditional rivals in the Firm, in the CIA, and in Intelligence Agencies throughout the world. Operations was perceived as the more glamourous, the area most civilians associated with Covert Intelligence, and it was common for DDIs, worldwide, to chafe at the injustice and inequities in acclaim and, more critically, in budget that went to the flashier of the two divisions.

Briggs and his counterpart had managed to achieve a sort of détente that had allowed a good working relationship for the past few years. Thor needed the raw information that Briggs's case officers obtained from their agents; Archangel needed the comprehensive National Security Assessments that Thor's people provided the President, the DCI, and the Committee each day.

"That comment earlier, about investigating our own people," she said hesitantly. "Did you have anyone particular in mind?"

She could see him thinking about his answer as he carefully combed his hair.

"No," he finally answered. "I don't think Thor has anything to do with our pseudo-Airwolf, but that doesn't mean he's not willing to take advantage of the situation. As far as our alleged rotton apple, your guess is as good as mine and a hell of a lot better than the Committee's."

Great.

Marella picked up a comb and started her attempts to tame the unruly mess that God, and her father's genetics, had blessed upon her

"We've identified every airport within 400 miles of the two sightings, and have had teams out to about a third of them already."

Briggs popped his head out of his closet. "400 miles? Jesus! That's a hell of a search radius."

"It looks like Airwolf but it's probably a Bell 222 or a 222B, which have a range of approximately 700 kilometers without a full complement. We're working in a grid pattern outward from the sightings. If they didn't refuel, they should be within a 200-mile radius. If they refueled…." She shrugged. "We're also checking all sources of av-fuel and any airports that are technically closed, but have hangars or other support buildings."

"Good," Briggs said, mostly into his closet.

"But?" she called back.

"Hmmm?" He emerged, in shirt and trousers with a silk tie draped around his neck.

"You said 'good,' but there was a 'but' in your voice," she said, smiling at his distracted expression.

"Oh." His full attention returned. "All things being equal, we will locate this pseudo-Airwolf using that approach." His mouth tightened. "Given enough time, that is."

Marella nodded. Briggs had said he'd only been able to buy them a few days. And speaking of time.. she checked the small clock on the vanity. If they wanted to eat, and get to work by 1PM, she'd better get dressed.

"I can pull more resources in from the field," she suggested.

His expression darkened for a second and then his eye lit with a deadly twinkle. "I'm thinking about a fresh approach to this particular Airwolf situation," he said, with more than a hint of sarcasm.

Marella was caught between two equally strong but opposing reactions. "Oh really?" won, in a photo finish with 'Uh-oh.'

Briggs dumped the clothing he'd worn yesterday onto the bed and sat on the bench to begin pulling on his socks and shoes. His grin seemed slightly maniacal to Marella.

"As the Committee is so absurdly zealous to know Airwolf's exact whereabouts, I thought we'd provide specifics."

Marella opened her mouth but couldn't find words to express her utter shock at this unexpected reversal of course.

"While in DC, I thought it prudent to obtain approval for a critically important Airwolf mission."

"What mission?" she asked hesitantly as she pulled a pair of white trousers from the closet. Heading to work on a Sunday didn't require a skirt and Lord knows she could use a day without pantyhose.

"Fly-fishing in Canada for all I care, but as the Committee requires a reminder of the significant value that Airwolf provides the Firm, it should at least retain the appearance of legitimacy. There are sufficient hot spots and operations underway. We'll come up with something."

"Okay," she said, reassured that he hadn't entirely lost his mind. "You want Airwolf out of town."

He nodded as he leaned over to tie his shoes.

"Did any of them really believe that Airwolf herself was involved in these incidents?" she asked, incredulous.

Briggs shrugged. "I doubt it, but it is a pretext I plan to eliminate."

Pulling a sweater over her head, Marella quickly sorted and eliminated half a dozen different scenarios.

"You obtained approval?" she asked. Of everything he'd said, that was the greatest departure from norm.

"From Zeus."

Which meant Archangel and Zeus had tightly compartmented the Airwolf mission. The Committee would only know of it if there were another incident and Zeus would stand witness to Airwolf's mission out of town. Which left them free to …

"What are we going to use for bait?"

Briggs smiled, a relaxed and slightly mischievous smile. "I thought we'd paint a Bell 222 for a start."


	5. Chapter 5

"Transceiver mostly," Denny said, holding up the small black box Hawke had discovered.

Hawke could see Caitlin glancing around the inside of Denny's shop. He supposed it was a bit overwhelming the first time but he'd been coming here since he was about fifteen and the stacks of circuit boards, capacitors, receivers, amplifiers, repeaters, vacuum tubes, bits of cable, broken CB radios, short wave radios in varying degrees of working order, copper wire, plus transponders of every shape and size, all threatening to fall from the over stacked shelves just felt like Denny to him. It was comforting in its claustrophobic clutter, in its owner's single-mindedness and in his communion with his beloved radios. Denny was quiet and his shop was peaceful, particularly on a gray, rainy Monday morning when there wasn't much traffic in the shop.

It had been hard finding two seats not covered in old radio parts, so Hawke stood, giving the one cracked old bentwood chair to Caitlin. He wasn't sure it was the right thing to do. It might have been safer for Caitlin to stand in Denny's shop. Avalanches had been known to occur.

"Kind of small, isn't it?" Caitlin asked.

Denny stared at her, clearly puzzled as to who this strange, freckle-covered skinny girl was, and how she came to be in his office. It took Denny a while to get used to new people so Hawke just ignored it.

"Not small," Denny answered, craning his neck to look up at Hawke. "Well-proportioned, elegantly designed. Top quality circuitry."

Hawke heard the questions in Denny's statements but the other man wouldn't push. He was more interested in the technology than the source anyway.

"So, transceiver," Caitlin said. "Transmission and receiver in that same small box."

Denny twitched when she called it small again, Hawke noted. Maybe Caitlin was a bit overwhelming for the poor guy.

"What's it transmitting and what's it receiving?" she said. "Is it transmitting what we say?"

Denny blinked a few times, nervously and then smoothed the thinning red hair on top of his head once, twice, three times.

"There's no microphone," he said, holding up the small box under the oversized light and table-mounted magnifying glass as if she could see what he saw. "See, there's no microphone. It can't transmit what you say."

"So what's it do, Denny?" Hawke asked.

Denny smiled, not showing his teeth. "It transmits and receives and it reads. It could do almost anything you ask it to do." A quick, nervous glance at Caitlin. "Except transmit speech because there's no microphone. Is this a prototype?"

Hawke and Caitlin exchanged sharp glances.

"What makes you think it's a prototype?" Hawke said carefully.

"It's wire wrap construction, which is more reliable than printed circuits but more expensive to build, so this probably isn't mass production. Less chance of the connections failing due to vibration or physical stresses on the baseboard. High quality, not mass produced, and a design I've never seen before." Denny shrugged. "Prototype."

"I don't know if it's a prototype," Hawke explained with unusual patience. "It's not mine. I need to know what it does, Denny. Not in the abstract of what it _can_ do. I want to know what it was actually doing in my helicopter."

"That depends where it was in your helicopter," Denny said. "Was it on your fuel gauge? It might have transmitted fuel tank capacity or state. Was it on your altimeter or your airspeed indicator?" He paused and his face scrunched into an image uncannily like Caitlin's when she was puzzled. "That's all the whirly-bird speak I know. I don't do helicopters, you know," he said with a glance in Caitlin's direction. "I know radios."

"Compass," Hawke said.

Denny shrugged. "Could be it was transmitting direction."

"What about location?" Hawke asked, his mood darkening.

"Oh sure," Denny agreed. "Where you were and where you were going both probably. It transmits, receives and it _reads._ It could read your compass."

Goddamn you, Michael, Hawke thought savagely, you said you wouldn't leave anything without discussing it first. A thought occurred to him and he laughed harshly, drawing a worried look from Caitlin. Briggs had never said that he'd leave something only if Hawke agreed, just that he wouldn't do so without discussing it first and they'd discussed it all right.

"Bastard told me that he was going to do it," Hawke muttered under his breath. "I just didn't understand him."

Caitlin was giving him a peculiar look but Denny was still enamored with the prototype Briggs had left in Airwolf. Not that talking to oneself in Denny's shop would be considered remarkable or even a little odd.

"What about the other one?" Hawke said.

A sea change swept over Denny's face.

"Oh that," he said, a careless gesture with his hand nearly knocking over a stack of circuit boards. "I'd say one of your passengers left his pager in your helicopter, but it's not a working pager. Just a jumble of circuitry stuffed into a plastic coffin," he summarized dismissively.

Hawke and Caitlin wore matching looks of surprise. He could see Caitlin chewing it over.

"Decoy?" she asked, finally.

"Decoy," he agreed.

"Somebody's garbage," Denny said. "Can I keep it?"

Caitlin held her laughter until they were outside of Denny's shop and climbing into her car.

"Oh. My. God," she sputtered, holding her stomach as she laughed. "Where did you find him? He's a little Leprechaun with a pot of copper wire."

Hawke pocketed the transceiver. It might come in useful some day, even if it was just for the satisfaction of throwing it in Archangel's face.

He waited, with rapidly expiring patience for Caitlin to recover from her laughing fit. "If you can't drive, I'll do it."

Still bent over, she wiped her eyes. "No, I'm good." She sat up, still grinning. "Seriously, I was expecting a chorus of 'The Lollipop Guild' at any moment?"

Hawke gave her a querulous, blank look.

"'The Lollipop Guild?'" she said, amazed. "You know, the song that the Munchkins sing in 'The Wizard of Oz?'"

Hawke sighed and folded his arm, prepared to wait her out.

"Hawke," she said with large eyes and mock dread, "tell me you've seen 'The Wizard of Oz."

"That's the movie that turns into color halfway through," he said. He scratched his ear. "Guys dressed up as a dancing bear or something. Not really my thing."

"A lion," Caitlin said, aghast. "Not a bear, the Cowardly Lion!" She just shook her head in disbelief as she started the engine. "I swear, sometimes I think you are from a different planet."

Hawke turned to look out the window to hide his grin when he couldn't hold it back any longer.

"…. And the horse of a different color," Caitlin was mumbling under her breath, "and the Flying Monkeys, and the Wicked Witch of the West…."

"Let's take a drive," he suggested suddenly.

Caitlin stepped her recitation and glanced at him. "Not the Lair," she said. "We're on call."

Hawke gestured at the windshield wipers keeping 3/4-time pushing water out of their view. "Even Thomakoles can't do location shooting in the rain."

"Half-hour turnaround," Caitlin said. "They call, we have to be there in 30 minutes. They're _paying_ us to be on call, remember?"

"They're paying Dom for us to be on call."

"And Dom pays us," she said, with exaggerated forbearance, "and we pay our bills and everyone is happy." She turned and looked in his direction. "Most everyone."

Their tires hissed through the water on the road, streetlights barely cutting through the oppressive gray air.

"Not gonna stop anytime soon," he said. "FSS says rain all day today, maybe tomorrow."

"Yeah," she agreed with a sigh. "Why's it have to go and rain? I'd kinda like to finish up this movie shoot and get back to normal flying and stuff."

Hawke kept his grin inside; she was weakening. He might yet convince her to take a drive out to the Lair.

Spending the weekend doing location shooting had left little time for another search, but something in the way Marella had agreed Airwolf was safe where she was – 'At present, yes' – had stayed with him, kept nagging at him. He and Caitlin had searched Airwolf, top to bottom, inside and out, and the Lair too. Hawke and Dom had gone back Friday night and had done another search. He was missing something and he didn't like the uncertainty that came with that.

The vibration from the beeper attached to the top of his jeans short-circuited his potential good mood. He squinted at the display, recognized the number for Santini Air and sighed.

"Guess Dom wants us back," Caitlin said, a quick glance at his face serving as confirmation.

"Still raining," he said dourly. "Can't be the movie shoot."

It wasn't.

This time the white Lincoln brought a scowl, not the promise of a pleasant alternative to movie flying, and the fair-haired, blue-eyed, white-garbed intelligence officer who emerged from it was wearing a skirt.

"Where's Archangel?"

Laura didn't appear to be even momentarily offended by Hawke's hostility nor his unconcealed assessment of her as understudy to Archangel and Marella. In fact, had he known her better, he might have thought she seemed amused but he hadn't worked with her often enough to decide.

"Archangel has a number of situations requiring his personal attention," Laura said, with the pleasant, reassuring and practiced smile of a flight attendant as she handed out three slender pale blue folders, one each to Hawke, Santini and Caitlin. "He asked me to brief you on this mission as it is time critical and couldn't wait until he was available."

Santini hmmphed and settled into his seat before opening his folder.

"It's a simple extraction. There is a man in Budapest who, shall we say, is in poor health. In order to restore his health, he will travel to the Nyíregyháza-Sóstófürdõ health resort, outside Nyíregyháza. That's the capital of Szabolcs-Szatmár-Bereg County, in the northeast corner of Hungary, bordering the Ukraine and Romania.

"The nearest airport is Nyreghaza. It's small, single runway, mostly the private planes of local officials. We're not even sure it has runway lights. The satellite photos on page 2 will give you a good idea. Coordinates are 47 degrees 58 North, 21 degrees 41 East, elevation 332 feet.

"Our man will be at the airport in Nyreghaza Thursday at 0130 Central European time. You're to be there with no running lights, stealth settings, at 0115 CET, and wait until 0230." Her lips tightened and the smile left her eyes. "If he's not there by 0230, he won't be coming. You break off and come home.

"His code name is Ferenc. He will ask you for transport to the Battle of Baia. There's a picture of him on page 3. You'll transport him to Ramstein Air Base, squawk the I.D. contained in your brief and he'll be met by one of our people. You can refuel at Ramstein, then come home. Any questions?"

Hawke, arms folded across his chest, had studied Laura throughout the recitation, not even bothering to open his briefing folder, which Caitlin seemed to be furiously studying.

"We can't go to Hungary this week," Santini said, shaking his head steadily. "We've already got a job, we're under contract."

Hawke wanted to laugh. Dominic's response had sounded all too much like 'I'm sorry we can't come out to play and save your spy but we have homework.'

Caitlin looked up, blinking. "But she said it's time critical." A puzzled appraisal of her two colleagues had her shaking her head.

"You don't need Airwolf for this job," Hawke said skeptically.

"Hungary has not completely shed Soviet control," Laura answered, leaning back on her high heels as if settling in for a debate. "We need to get in and out quickly and Airwolf is the best alternative. She's an armored, stealth aircraft, invisible to conventional radar with a state of the art weapon systems." She gave him a look he couldn't quite decipher. "And she's meant to be used, Mr. Hawke."

"I'm not running an air taxi service," Hawke said, scowling. "What's the urgency?"

"An agent who has been operating under suspicion has finally agreed to be extracted. We need to get him out before he's arrested."

Santini groaned. "You want us to go into the Soviet Bloc after a guy who's hot?"

Laura smiled wanly. "That would be one of the reasons to build armored, stealth aircraft, Mr. Santini. Besides, the Hungarian National Security Services are expecting him to try for Austria when he runs. We're sending him in the direction of the USSR."

"Doesn't matter, we still have a job here," Santini said stubbornly.

"Of course," Laura said calmly. "We certainly don't want to interrupt the production schedule of another Paullina Prince film."

Hawke felt his mouth twitch against his will and heard Caitlin snigger. Even Santini was struggling to keep a scowl on his face.

"If you'll just loan us the use of Airwolf," Laura continued, "we'll be sure to return her with a full tank of fuel."

Hawke laughed. "No, you can't have the keys. And Dom's got a point – he has a contract. We can't just take off."

Laura nodded intently. "That's not a problem. We'll take care of it."

Santini looked doubtful but Hawke was just as happy to get Airwolf away from prying eyes and didn't particularly want to know how the Firm would solve their contract issue.

"Okay," he said gruffly. "As long as Dom still gets paid for the job, we'll go get your guy."

Amidst Caitlin's war whoops and Santini's sputtering, Laura exited gracefully, looking just a little pleased with herself. Hawke's eyes followed her as she slipped into the car like a lady, sliding her bottom in first and then swinging in her legs, held together tightly, after her. Laura was the picture of graceful propriety but she somehow lacked the powerful self-assurance that Marella possessed. Great legs though, Hawke decided, even for one of Archangel's staffers.

"You sure this isn't just another attempt to grab the Lady?"

Hawke turned his attention back to Santini and shrugged. "Possible but I don't think so." Santini looked unconvinced. "Archangel's not going to try anything in the Soviet Bloc. He wants to set us up, he'll do it closer to home or at least in allied territory."

"Well maybe it's not Archangel I'm worried about," Santini replied sharply. "Ever think of that?"

Hawke sighed. He'd thought of little else these past few days.

"Archangel's the one sending us to Hungary," Caitlin argued, jean-clad legs swinging in time with the rain beating on the hangar roof.

"No," Santini said, turning back and forth between Caitlin and Hawke, "_he_ ain't. That pretty lady with the legs up to here is sending us to Hungary."

"She works for him," Hawke said. "Not the first time Michael's sent an aide to brief us for a mission, but if you want, I'll call him." He inclined his head in Santini's direction, waiting for a reaction to his offer but Santini just threw his arms up and walked away, muttering.


	6. Chapter 6

Ferenc was early, which made Hawke a little nervous since they were a good fifteen minutes early themselves. As they approached Nyreghaza airport, Santini ran infrared scans that showed only one person, huddled under the wing of a small four-seater. No other signs of human life at the airport, no lights, no guards, no indication of anyone lying in wait for Airwolf or for her cargo.

It would have seemed almost too good to be true except for the stress of landing in complete black out conditions. Even with the night vision capabilities in Airwolf's helmets, Hawke had to consciously loosen his grip on the stick, nerves taut since they'd entered Hungarian airspace. He eased her very slowly to the cracked tarmac of an ill-maintained runway and then waited in silence.

It was five full minutes before Ferenc moved from his position under the wing of a small plane, but then he moved decisively towards the helicopter, following his ears if not his eyes. Even with the greatest stealth technology, there was still a quiet hum, audible if one was expecting it; more difficult to see a mostly black helicopter with no running lights in the deep night of a new moon.

Hawke heard the hiss of hydraulics as Caitlin opened the port hatch, heard the hushed noise of the night outside slip into Airwolf's cabin, then a quiet, halting voice in French-accented English.

"I am seeking transport to the Battle of Baia?"

Hawke glanced to his left. The man, framed in the hatchway was a suit, a nervous looking man of fifty-odd years, probably a bureaucrat. Yet apparently, this little mouse of a man had possessed the audacity to provide the Firm with something of value, probably running untold risks, not least of which would be a trial and summary execution were he arrested by his own government. Bravery didn't always come in a Special Forces container; Hawke had learned that in Vietnam.

"Name?" Caitlin asked briskly.

"Ferenc."

Caitlin reached a hand down and pulled the man in. Santini helped him climb back into the cabin and then tugged down the jump seat, got Ferenc settled and strapped in. Ferenc carried a suitcase, enough for the journey of a week perhaps. Hawke wondered what the man had left behind in Budapest.

"Next stop, Landsstuhl-Ramstein," Hawke said.

There was no mistaking that the brief smile from the man contained both exhaustion and relief. Fifteen minutes into the flight, Hawke heard quiet snores coming from the aft cabin.

"That better not be you, Dom."

"Poor guy's all tuckered out," Santini said, his voice warm with sympathy. "Probably been on the run, afraid to sleep."

Hawke thought about packing his whole life into one battered, leather suitcase, what he'd choose to take, what he'd leave behind.

"Yeah."

Caitlin's voice filtered through the helmet comm system. "I wonder if he was married. Had a family."

"No ring," Santini said decisively.

"That doesn't mean anything," Caitlin protested. "Not all men wear a wedding ring and besides, in some countries don't they wear it on the right hands instead of their left?"

This was rapidly evolving into the type of conversation in which Hawke had absolutely no interest and despite his reputation as not particularly sensitive, it wasn't exactly fair to their passenger to turn him into an exhibit. He exhaled a little into his helmet mike.

"He's not wearing a ring on either hand."

"Like I said, that doesn't mean anything…."

Hawke cleared his throat, loudly, and silence that descended was maintained, for the most part, through the remaining hours until they reached Landsstuhl-Ramstein Air Base.

The Firm's person at Ramstein, a briskly efficient young woman in a white raincoat, delivered a box of sandwiches and a thermos of fresh coffee for the Airwolf crew before she escorted Ferenc to the next stage of his journey. A medical examination followed by the first round of debriefing, Hawke guessed. Laura hadn't provided that detail and he hadn't asked but he knew that the Firm didn't allow defectors or extracted agents anywhere near HQ facilities until they were sure the person wasn't a provocateur. A policy they'd extended to rescued operatives and case officers after Archangel's recovery from East Germany.

A better than expected sandwich filling his stomach and a steaming cup of coffee warming one hand, Hawke felt both content and marginally recharged. He looked at the series of clocks, checked local time against L.A. time, which was nine hours behind, and initiated contact via the scrambler built into Airwolf's main instrument panel.

Two minutes went by without any answer from Knightsbridge. Hawke felt uneasiness begin to spread, outward from his now churning stomach throughout his digestive system, nerves beginning to twitch and an ache starting in the back of his neck where tension preferred to take up residence.

"It's 2100 hours there," Caitlin offered. "Kind of after business hours. They probably went home."

Hawke just looked at her for a few seconds, saw that she was just as puzzled and was only trying to allay his concerns.

"Archangel stayed up all night when we pulled Moses out of Russia," Santini said, unhelpfully. "Marella, too."

"Moses was kind of a personal friend," Hawke said, almost to himself, seeking some kind of reason in the situation. "Saved Michael's life."

"Laura did say that Michael was tied up in some other things," Caitlin said. "He might not even be at Knightsbridge right now."

It was a valid point, Hawke decided. Briggs had sounded busy, almost stressed, when Hawke had called him before leaving for Hungary. There'd been no harm in checking out Dom's slightly paranoid theory of Laura participating in some nefarious plot to capture Airwolf. Briggs' thanks for taking the exfiltration job had been reassuring, even if the Firm's lack of progress in identifying the phantom Airwolf was not.

"Did Laura ask us to check in after the handoff?" Caitlin asked. "We did hand Ferenc off to someone from the Firm, you know. She'll probably status Knightsbridge."

"Yeah, maybe." Hawke said, grudgingly. It was another valid point, the logic of which did nothing to calm his oddly persistent unease. It was as if his body had raised its own personal DEFCON status, without direction from his conscious brain.

"Tired?"

Hawke nodded. It'd do no harm to allow Caitlin to take the next stage of the flight home. He'd done the hard stuff, the trip into and out of hostile airspace, the black out landing.

"Maybe you can get some sleep," she suggested.

"Yup," he answered, eyes wide open, as they would be until they were off the ground.

The dark corner of an American airbase would be an ideal spot for DOD to make a grab for Airwolf, assuming DOD had any idea Airwolf was within reach. They'd squawked a call sign identifying themselves as an Air Force Pave Hawk performing Medevac duty and Ramstein Air Traffic Control hadn't blinked an eye. Airwolf looked nothing like a Sikorsky so the sooner the crew handling the refueling finished up, the happier Hawke would be.

He saw the thumbs up from the crew chief at the same time Caitlin did. She immediately began the engine pre-start check and they worked together in silent communion to get Airwolf into the air as quickly as safety would permit.

"Engine starting," Caitlin said

"Main Rotor clear," he replied.

Hawke used his helmet's night vision to scan the airport. No sudden movements, no vehicles heading in their direction, nothing out of the ordinary. ATC gave the clearance for takeoff and Caitlin had them in the air as soon as possible without drawing unnecessary attention.

"You're a little jumpy." Santini's voice through the comm. system was just a little accusing.

"Not a pleasure flight," Hawke said, scanning the ground below.

The growing number of automobile headlights on the roads was the first sign that Germany was waking up and they were running slightly behind schedule. They'd have to avoid the heavier air traffic patterns.

He thought about trying to contact Knightsbridge again, maybe try Archangel's satellite phone, slightly annoyed that Airwolf obviously wasn't Briggs' top priority, and then grew annoyed at himself for being so petty.

Flying with turbos cut trip time by over 60 percent but made it a lot more exhausting for the pilots. Two hours sleep, trade off with Caitlin for two hours flying, and then see who was rested enough for the last leg, while Santini catnapped in the engineer's position. They were inside California state lines when the scrambler activated with an incoming call.

Hawke tapped the transmit key. "'Bout time, Michael. I thought the Firm ran 24 by 7." To be fair it was nearing 0400, California time, so maybe the Firm did run around the clock.

There was an audible pause, a repeated loop of silence, static, silence, static that lasted for a few seconds.

"Airwolf, this is Knightsbridge calling," said a familiar voice, just not the voice Hawke had expected.

He frowned and exchanged a sour look with Caitlin. "Go ahead, Knightsbridge."

"Hawke? This is Laura Messner from Archangel's office."

"Someone's up late," Santini said, his voice raspy with exhaustion.

"We already delivered your package, Knightsbridge," Hawke said, voice almost as hoarse as Santini's. "Called earlier but no one was home."

Another audible pause.

"Package received, thank you, Airwolf. Sorry we missed your call," Laura said smoothly. "Can you provide ETA on your return?"

Hawke blew out a breath, considering all of the possible reasons for that question, before he keyed the transmit button again.

"Taking our time this leg, Knightsbridge" he lied. "My crew's tired and so am I so if you've got another job lined up, it's going to have to wait until we get some sleep."

He didn't have to look at Caitlin or Santini to know exactly what type of stares they'd be giving him. They were less than an hour from the Lair.

"Understood, Airwolf. We expected you back sometime mid-afternoon, sounds like you're on track for that."

"Roger that, Knightsbridge," Hawke said with a grin.

"Airwolf, I have a special request that you come in for debriefing at Knightsbridge, upon arrival."

"That better be a joke," Hawke snapped. "You have any idea how many hours we've been up, flying black out conditions into denied area territory? Tell Archangel he can take his debriefing…."

"The request was from Zeus, not Archangel," Laura said loudly enough to break through his tirade.

Hawke blinked, tired brain trying to make sense of incoming information and failing. He decided it was a damn good thing that he'd bought himself nearly twelve hours before he was expected at the Firm offices.

"What the hell for?"

Hawke would have sworn he heard a gulp travel through the airwaves, but it could've been Caitlin. He glanced her way but she shrugged.

"I'm afraid I'm not at liberty to provide more than basic details, Hawke. I assure you that Zeus will bring you up to date on the latest in our series of incidents."

Incidents? Oh hell, that stupid helicopter painted to look like Airwolf was raising hell while the real thing was thousands of miles away, saving lives. And if Zeus was sticking his hand in, it meant Archangel's strategy had failed.

"What did it do now?"

Another pause, this time longer than the ones previous, as if Laura was making up her mind.

"I think Zeus wanted to tell you this, but…" she hesitated only a moment. "Yesterday, at approximately 1640, a helicopter with the same markings and profile as Airwolf shot down one of our helicopters."

Hawke groaned. That explained Zeus's involvement and 'request' for debriefing but every time the Committee tried to micromanage, things went to hell in a hand basket. Zeus and the Committee should have learned after any number of times, and especially the incident with Harlan Jenkins, that they'd get faster and more effective results letting Archangel run the operations.

"Anyone hurt?" he asked, hoping it wasn't anyone he knew, any of Archangel's people.

"The helicopter was using the call sign Angel One."

Hawke heard Caitlin's sudden inhalation, Santini's quiet oath, but his own mouth was dry and his lips couldn't form the syllables to respond.

"Angel One?" Caitlin said, hesitantly. "Isn't that…"

"…Archangel's helicopter," Santini finished. "_Sweet Jesus_."

Not his helicopter, Hawke thought bleakly. It was Michael's personal call sign.

"Survivors?" he finally blurted.

"Both Archangel and the pilot were still alive when extracted from the wreckage," Laura said, her voice not nearly as steady as it was previously. "They were transported to the closest Major Trauma Center. We're waiting on word from our people there."

"Which hospital?"

"I'm sorry, Hawke, but that's restricted information. When you come in…"

"I'm not coming to Knightsbridge. You better remind Zeus that I sure as hell don't work for him." Hawke briefly closed his eyes, seeking control of his temper. "Who was flying?"

Both the volume and the pitch of her voice rose. "Hawke, you're going to get me in trouble. I wasn't supposed to tell you as much as I have."

"Who was flying?" Hawke repeated. "Was it Marella?"

"No," Laura relented. "I don't think you know the pilot. Karen's seconded to us from the Air Force. She's an excellent pilot."

"Where's Marella?" Hawke asked.

"Going out of her mind," Caitlin said, her voice just a murmur.

"At the hospital," Laura said. "Don't even bother trying to find it. It's not our clinic but I can promise you that no one's getting anywhere near either of them."

"Kind of a little late for that," Santini said sourly. "And anyway, maybe we just want to see Marella."

"Then come here. Zeus wants a situation update at 0700; she'll be back in the office for that and probably heading up part of the investigation."

Hawke thought about it, weighed the predictable and futile discussion with Zeus about Airwolf's return against the chance to learn something about the crash, about the bogus Airwolf that had just taken the game to a lethal level.

"All right," Hawke gritted out. "We're on our way, but you keep us informed."

"Thanks." Laura sounded relieved and a little grateful.

"What's his condition?"

"Critical," she said, tersely. Hawke could hear her take a deep breath. "They're both extremely critical."

"Airwolf out."


	7. Chapter 7

Author's note: I'm posting chapters a few at a time to allow me to obsessively tweak and polish to my satisfaction, changing a word here or there, removing or adding an article, trying to ensure that everything contributes to the story. Sorry if you don't like the WIP formula; this story is mostly done, a few chapters to go.

* * *

"You should sleep."

Hawke, pacing, tired and growing more tired and irritable by the moment, didn't bother to acknowledge the obvious.

"Seriously," Caitlin said bravely, his personal mouse de-thorning the lion's paw, "You're exhausted, we're not supposed to be at Knightsbridge for another eight hours and let's face it, you're no good to Michael or anyone else if you're too tired to think straight."

Which completely ignored the critical fact that he'd sleep if he could, if his racing mind would let him. If it would stop, for even a minute, supplying him images of every helicopter crash he'd ever seen: civilian and military, mechanical failures and combat damage.

He'd seen helicopters shot out of the sky and helicopters hit by incoming fire that became wounded, struggling birds. Controlling the descent of the first was impossible. Controlling the descent of the second was possible but damn difficult, even for a good pilot. Hawke wondered just how good that Air Force pilot had been.

He wanted to sleep. Instead, he saw, in dozens of different scenarios, Angel One hit the ground. He needed to know how it had happened; at the very least to shelter his mind from the horrific variations he was capable of envisioning. He needed to examine the wreckage, understand how the white Bell had been wounded, how the hunter had driven his prey into the ground. If he understood the hunter's strategy, if he could get inside the hunter's mind, he might have a chance of finding him.

He needed to go to Knightsbridge, despite his exhaustion, _because_ of his exhaustion, because he couldn't sleep until hard cold reality had banished the images his subconscious provided.

"We're not going to Knightsbridge."

Caitlin's brows popped up and her mouth opened but Santini beat her to it.

"What do you mean we're not going?" he all but shouted. "You told that girl we were on our way and I, for one, would like to find out what the heck is going on!"

Hawke shook his head. "You're not going. I am."

Santini stood, hands on hips, scowling and combative. "You're in no shape to fly anywhere. You'll fall asleep at the controls."

"So I'll drive." Hawke shrugged, past the point of arguing. He made a move towards the Jeep parked inside the Lair, towards the first hint of daylight peeking through the gap in the walls that served as entrance and exit for ground vehicles and pedestrians.

Santini stepped directly in front of him, hands spread and held in front of him to stop Hawke. Only his eyes betrayed a slight hesitation, worry that he clamped down upon and set his jaw, resolved.

"Don't make me move you," Hawke warned, voice dropping to a low growl.

"You're not making sense, String," Santini said, almost pleadingly. "You got two hours sleep in the last twenty-four and you're haring off, looking for a fight."

Hawke's hands hurt. Surprised to find they'd fisted, fingernails digging into his palms, he unclenched them carefully.

"Just tell us why you don't want us to go," Caitlin said.

Hawke turned back to look at her, saw the fear frozen eyes -- fear for him, fear of him -- and forced himself to relax his body, unclench his jaw.

"Zeus," he answered, succinctly.

Caitlin's eyes went wide, puzzled. She waved at Airwolf's open hatch doors, at the rocks scattered near the Lair's walls. "Can we sit, just for a minute? 'Cause I don't understand."

"You can sit," Hawke answered gruffly. He continued to pace, noted that no one actually sat down. They were picking up the nervous energy he was shedding, a slight edge of panic infecting the pack.

"So," Santini challenged, arms folded, still standing between Hawke and the exit.

"I think Zeus is going to try to recover Airwolf."

Santini snorted, half-laughed, patting her fuselage affectionately. "What makes now any different?"

"Someone -- maybe Zeus, maybe the Committee -- ordered Archangel to recover Airwolf last week. Archangel didn't do it. Hell, he didn't even try."

He watched them digest his terse summary, Caitlin blinking away disbelief, Santini rubbing his chin and frowning.

"You saying that Zeus had something to do with Archangel's copter going down?"

Hawke shrugged. "The Committee wants Airwolf back, Zeus wants Airwolf back and Archangel has managed, up 'til now, to convince them that he can't recover her intact, and that they're better off as is. But with Archangel out of the picture…." He trailed off and gestured, trying to convey for them to fill in what was unsaid.

"Okay," Caitlin said, her face and voice pensive, "you're saying that this whole thing with the mocked-up Airwolf was run by Zeus or someone inside the Firm to recover Airwolf and that instead of just of just putting a lot more pressure on Archangel, or setting a trap for us, or performing a serious search, they shot down Angel One?"

She sighed and sat down in an open hatchway, letting her frown emphasize her skepticism. Or maybe it wasn't a frown, but just exhaustion. Hawke couldn't really tell as his own eyes were having a little trouble focusing.

"I didn't say any of that. I just said that I think Zeus is going to try to recover Airwolf since Archangel has been conveniently removed as an obstacle."

Hawke regretted his choice of words almost immediately, even more so when he saw Caitlin wince.

"Then why go see Zeus at all?" Santini asked quietly.

Hawke scratched his jaw. His own thoughts were jumbled enough that he had to search for words to make this sound like it made any sense.

"I think Zeus is going to count on us," he grimaced, "on _me_, reacting in an predictable way to the attack on Archangel." He hesitated, still arranging his thoughts. "He'll expect our sole focus to be finding whoever is flying that other helicopter and whoever is behind it. Taking them out." He grimaced again. "If I go see him, I can make sure he sees what he's expecting to see, but I need someone to guard against a flank attack."

"So we stay here?" Santini looked around the inside of the Lair. They hadn't come equipped for camping.

"Wait a minute, Hawke," Caitlin said, holding up a hand, her face a mask of firm resolve. "If what you say is true, then wouldn't Zeus come looking for Airwolf when we're most distracted, least able to outwit him?"

Hawke tilted his head, thought about it and exhaled, suddenly more tired than he'd already been.

"That would be now, wouldn't it?" Santini said, glancing up through the chimney opening to the gradually lightening sky. His worried expression mirrored Hawke's own interior thoughts.

"Except he's not expecting us back yet," Caitlin countered, her eyes glittering. "Hawke, you gave him an ETA of this afternoon. You show up at Knightsbridge now, he knows we're back early and that we got no sleep."

"Might as well be a Vegas sign announcing that we're vulnerable," Santini agreed, a little more happily than Hawke thought was warranted. "How about we all get some sleep and then you go see Zeus. You can go an hour or two early, catch him off guard and still get some rest between now and then. We'll stay here with the Lady."

"I can't sleep," Hawke muttered under his breath.

"What?"

"He said he can't sleep," Caitlin replied, her voice softening. "You might want to try actually lying down instead of pacing."

Hawke threw her a glare and continued moving, circling Airwolf protectively, kicking up enough dust to color the bottom of his jeans a dirty red-brown.

Santini harrumphed and climbed into Airwolf's cabin, digging through a storage compartment to drag out the scratchy wool Army blankets they kept for emergencies. He handed one to Caitlin, tossed another onto the cabin floor and threw the third in Hawke's direction as he paced by the hatch opening.

Hawke caught it without thinking.

"How about you try sitting maybe?" Santini offered genially. "Not sleeping, per se. Just a rest."

Hawke frowned, ready to argue when he caught the squeal of the scrambler. He turned rapidly back towards Airwolf's flight deck and saw Caitlin initiating the contact.

She gave him a rueful half-smile. "I thought I'd check to see if there was any news."

Hawke wasn't sure if she was doing it for herself or for him, so he just nodded and waited as Caitlin pulled on a helmet.

"Airwolf calling Knightsbridge, come in Knightsbridge."

Hawke unfolded the blanket, shook it lightly, all actions automatic, attention on Caitlin and the scrambler.

"Airwolf calling Knightsbridge, come in Knightsbridge."

A section of static cut out and then, "Go ahead, Airwolf, this is Knightsbridge."

This voice was not familiar and Caitlin bit her lip and shot a look at Hawke who shrugged.

"Knightsbridge, we're looking for an update," she said. "We're looking for status from Marella Duval or Laura," she hesitated, heard Hawke fill in the missing name, "Messner."

"Airwolf, I'm afraid they're both unavailable. This is Judith Claget. I work for Marella and I can help you."

Caitlin met Hawke's eyes and he read there his very own thoughts. This Judith Claget was not known; assume nothing, get information, give nothing.

"Knightsbridge, we want an update on Archangel's status," Caitlin said briskly.

A brief pause, possibly a flustered junior staffer manning communications during the crisis and wondering what she was allowed to share and what to hold back.

"Not much to report, Airwolf. His condition is unchanged. Both Archangel and Karen were moved from recovery to ICU and are being closely monitored."

Caitlin pursed her lips and shot a frustrated look at Hawke.

"Knightsbridge," she began and then changed tack, "Judith, can you provide any more detail than that? Current condition, extent of injuries, prognosis?"

"Actually, it's just Jude," the young woman answered and Caitlin gave a tired smile. Attempting to elicit additional information via a personal approach wouldn't have worked on Laura or Meryl if they didn't want to give it out.

"Jude, we're pretty worried," Caitlin said in confidential tones. "What can you tell us?"

Jude's sigh filtered through the scrambler.

"Airwolf, we're all pretty worried," she admitted and Hawke felt his stomach bottom out. "The hospital is saying they're both in extremely critical condition. The surgeons have done all they can, we're just waiting to see if they pull through."

"How extensive are their injuries, Jude?"

"Sorry, Airwolf, I don't have any details beyond general condition. Can I help you with anything else?"

Hawke shook his head, frustrated and worried and doubtful that he'd sleep at all. This unknown person, this Jude who said she worked for Marella, hadn't given them much more than what they already knew, with the exception of at least knowing that Michael was still alive.

"Jude, Laura Messner promised to keep us informed. Can you ensure we get updated every four hours? And in between if there's any change?"

"Will do, Airwolf. Any change in ETA?"

Caitlin grinned at Hawke and then at Santini. "No change in ETA, Jude. That's why it's important you keep us informed."

"Got it. Every four hours, Airwolf. Knightsbridge out."

Caitlin keyed the scrambler to automatic receive and tugged the helmet over her head.

"A wake-up call?" Hawke asked dryly.

She shrugged, running a hand to smooth hair full of static electricity. "Partly. Mostly just to keep them thinking we're hours away. I used the helmet so I'd sound more like we were still flying."

"You're almost as devious as he is," Santini said with an affectionate glance at Hawke as he shook out his blanket and spread it on a softer patch of sandy ground.

Catilin grinned. "Just following the play he called, Dom."

Santini settled onto his blanket. "String, let us get a little sleep and then one of will drive back to the hangar with you in the Jeep." He nodded in Caitlin's direction. "Ladies get first choice, since you might want to use a real bathroom or something. Get some supplies and fly back. We can settle in here and keep an eye on things until you tell us otherwise."

"Might pick up a tail on the way back," Hawke said darkly.

"Kind of hard for a tail to stay hidden once you get out here," Santini said.

"Not with radar."

Santini sat up, exasperated. "Well, since you've got all the big plans, why don't you just tell us what you want us to do?"

Hawke dropped his head down, rubbed his forehead. Truth be told, he was about planned out for the moment. The Hungary mission had taken its toll, physically, and the attack on Archangel had taken its toll, mentally. He finally shook his head.

"I don't know, Dom, but I'll tell you when I do."

He climbed into Airwolf and settled into the pilot's seat. If he could sleep, he'd sleep better inside than on the Lair's mix of sand and rocks. He leaned back in the seat, closed his eyes and tried to think of blue sky flying, late afternoon sun spilling over Eagle Lake and the quiet whisper of wind through pine trees.

* * *

Laura's long legs set a pace that Hawke was hard-pressed to maintain. 

"Forty millimeter cannon fire shot up the tail boom, cut the tail rotor blades into hair pins. One or more of the shells clipped the fuel line. They tried an autorotation to get on the ground as quickly as possible."

She stopped in front of a single elevator door set back from the corridor, and jabbed a four digit code into a solid black digital pad.

"There were no good options for landing," she continued, without a glance in Hawke's direction. "Too many trees, no clearings. The power company maintains a nearby right-of-way, trees cut back twenty-five feet each side of the pylons and lines."

Hawke winced and Laura sighed.

He held up a hand. Apology, empathy, recognizing the best choice in a field of no other solutions. "I would've tried it too."

She nodded. "They were spinning against the torque, of course, little or no control. A skid caught an electrical cable and they clipped the pylon."

Hawke winced again, tried to suppress the shudder. Failed.

The elevator doors slid open almost noiselessly and he followed Laura into the dull metallic interior. Fingertips traced the solid metal walls – no seams he could find. He wondered if it was bulletproof. There were no buttons to push, no floor selections to make; this elevator was non-stop.

Laura's tongue darted out, licked her lips and Hawke was surprised how little it resembled anything seductive.

"They dropped the last thirty, forty feet. Sideways." Her eyes flickered in Hawke's direction for a second. "A main rotor blade hit first, dug into the ground, snapped, and tossed the cockpit into the base of the pylon."

Hawke shifted in the elevator. "Pretty detailed witness statements."

"Some of that was reconstruction," Laura admitted. "After they dropped below the tree line, the traffic copter lost sight of them."

At the Firm's request, the FBI was holding the traffic copter's pilot as a material witness, but it was only a matter of time before his story hit the media. Archangel had contained the story up until this point; Hawke lacked confidence that the Firm could keep it under wraps without Archangel's subtlety.

The elevator doors slid open.

The security on this corridor was, if anything, even heavier than that he'd seen throughout the complex. Hawke's eyes sought and met the hard, challenging gazes of the Firm's security officers who evaluated his threat potential to Zeus, to the remaining Firm leadership, to the Firm itself. He heard a deep voice, sotto voce, "He's Archangel's," and the piercing assessment abated; they watched him now under heavy lidded gazes in the wary manner they saw everyone.

Laura rapped sharply on an unmarked door at the end of the corridor and then stepped back. The door opened almost immediately and Hawke followed her into Zeus's office, through what was obviously the back door.

With his baldpate and thick features, Zeus appeared more brawn than brain, and if the stories told about him were true, he'd used his physical power to his advantage in his various postings, military and clandestine. Custom made suits – New York, not London – and shrewd intellect made him look more banker than brawler and years behind a desk had shed muscle, leaving him leaner but by no means frail. He held Archangel's wary respect, but not trust. Hawke gave him neither.

"Hawke."

Zeus was standing and he gave no sign of offering Hawke a seat, so Hawke sat, sprawled in a leather club chair ten feet from the Firm's Director who watched him without any reaction whatsoever.

Hawke was barely aware of Laura Messner leaving the room, still disconcerted at finding Zeus waiting for him alone. Arrival through the back door to meet privately with Zeus did not seem to offer many positive outcomes.

"Let me get straight to the point. Archangel is not expected to survive his injuries."

Hawke was glad he was sitting. He might have staggered from the merciless impact of words said in a voice far too calm for the contained message.

"That information is, of course, privileged," Zeus said, one eye twitching slightly. "I want the perpetrators of this heinous attack either in custody or wiped off the face of this planet before any funeral or memorial services are held."

_You son of a bitch_, was the only thought Hawke was capable of processing.

"I am confident that I'll have your full support in achieving that goal," Zeus said, tone lifting slightly at the end, as if his statement thought about being a question before deciding upon certainty.

"Not for that end result," Hawke said in a low rumble. "The Firm has almost unlimited assets, you can find a doctor that can save Archangel."

"There was major trauma, Hawke," Zeus said quietly, almost gently. "Multiple fractures, extensive damage to his internal organs. The blood loss was too extensive to keep oxygen flowing to all of his vital organs."

Hawke shook his head. "Has to be something you can do. What about dialysis or transplant?"

"I'm sorry; I wish that were an option but in the time frame we have…" Zeus gestured, a hand spread outward expressively and then clenched. "Archangel's death is going to be huge loss for us professionally and for many of us, myself included, an immense personal loss."

Hawke was silent, reeling. He'd expected Zeus to manipulate, to use Hawke's emotions against him, to attempt to knock him off his feet, metaphorically speaking. It had never occurred to him that Zeus might succeed.

"Archangel's staff knows that his condition is very critical and that the prognosis is poor. They know I've named an Acting Deputy Director. His name is Laban and he'll be here shortly." Zeus's gaze burned into Hawke. "Under the circumstances, we'll defer our usual discussion about Airwolf's return. I expect you to offer Laban the same level of access and support from Airwolf that you've provided Archangel in the past. Help him find those individuals responsible."

The door Hawke had entered suddenly opened again and Zeus glanced at Hawke before walking around the massive walnut desk and taking his seat.

It was a strange dismissal. It had been a strange meeting. Hands grasping the leather arms, Hawke pushed himself up from his seat.

"You've made the mistake of counting Michael out before," he said with as much confidence as he could muster. "More than once. And he's proved you wrong every time."

Zeus didn't respond. Hawke hadn't expected him to do so and he wondered exactly which of them he was trying to convince.


	8. Chapter 8

Hawke wasn't sure what he hated most. The sight of a replacement at Archangel's desk or a feeling like that of re-injuring a bruise that he felt every time he saw Marella talking to Laban, whose fair hair and blue eyes were too much of a reminder of the man he was replacing. That Marella towered over the shorter, stocky Laban did little to relieve Hawke's discomfort and he wasn't sure if it was better or worse that Laban wasn't wearing white.

"Run it again," Laban ordered and Laura restarted the videotape.

The images were disjointed and out of focus. The camera was mounted to the traffic copter to capture images below, its lens set for a much greater distance and the twenty seconds it had actually captured images after frantic repositioning by the traffic reporter told them little they didn't already know.

"No ADF pod, obviously," Marella said. "Cannons are mounted in the wings, like Airwolf. Ballistics reports no match in any records on the 40 mm shells that were recovered. Retractable landing gear. From a distance, she could be Airwolf's twin."

Hawke disagreed but decided to keep his mouth shut. He still wasn't entirely sure what role he'd been assigned, how exactly he fit into this team.

Laban exhaled. "Is it worth listening to the audio tape from tower control?"

Laura shook her head and reached into a folder in front of her, extracting a few pages stapled together. "Here's a transcript." She passed a copy to everyone seated in front of Archangel's desk. "At 16:38:20, Angel One, specially the pilot, Karen Allenden, notified Knightsbridge tower control of bogey sighting and requested backup. At 16:39:13, Angel One notified the tower that they'd taken a closer look and were unable to identify the pilots." She turned back to face Laban. "Two pilots, both male, wearing headsets, not helmets as the Airwolf pilots do. At 16:39:55, Angel One reported that they were under fire and had been hit. Knightsbridge tower lost contact shortly after that. Total time from initial sighting of the bogey to the crash is under two minutes."

The transcript was a lot more detailed than that, Hawke thought, skimming through it rapidly, a play by play of the unfolding crisis up through the attempts to somehow get Angel One on the ground. Apparently the pilot, Allenden, had left the channel to the tower open and she and Archangel had been talking almost the full two minutes. Reading what appeared to be a faithful transcription, Hawke could almost hear the surprised outrage in Archangel's voice, "Goddamnit, they're _firing_ at us!"

He swallowed away the lump in his throat.

"DI?" Laban said with a look at a man Hawke didn't know.

"We can't say whether this was opportunistic or targeted. As the attack was within fifteen miles of Knightsbridge, there's equal probability that they would have hit any of our helicopters…"

"Is it DI's assessment that it's a coincidence that a fake-Airwolf took out the head of our Airwolf project?" Laban demanded.

The other man flushed. "No, sir, but we cannot clearly determine whether this was a targeted attack or a more general attack on a Firm helicopter. Archangel was returning from a code word clearance project site. No flight plan was filed. He had no scheduled return time, nor did his office provide any estimates of his return to any callers. Our bogeys would need to know where he was to target him in particular and we haven't found how they could have done so."

"Air Traffic Control," Marella said suddenly.

"You use Firm call signs with ATC?" Hawke asked, surprised.

"I meant Air Route Traffic Control Centers," she said, looking distracted as she shook her head. "And no, we squawk tail numbers."

"Our bogey would have needed to know the specific tail numbers," Laban said pensively. "And they'd need someone at the appropriate ARTCC."

"Could've hacked the system," Hawke offered.

"Did Archangel tend to use the same helicopter?" Laban asked, looking directly at Marella.

Hawke didn't catch it at first, was surprised at how Marella flinched at the question.

"He uses whatever is available," Laura answered firmly. "Generally the mechanics give us one of two, both Bell 407s. I'll find out whether or not there was any contact with ARTCC."

Hawke flipped back through the transcript of the tower call, and then fingered the pertinent entry.

"16:39:13, Angel One notified the tower that they'd taken a closer look and were unable to identify the pilots," he read, looking first at Marella and then Laban. "That look went both ways."

Laban studied Hawke. "So it's possible that the bogey fired on Angel One only after realizing Archangel was aboard."

Hawke shrugged. "Anything's possible. That bogey was in the area for a reason, maybe looking for Archangel or maybe just looking for a Firm helicopter." His lips tightened. "They hit the jackpot."

Laban nodded slowly. "You're the only combat pilot here. What else have you picked up?"

Hawke blew out a breath as he considered the question and his answer. "Two things. First, the pilot of that bogey has practice firing those guns, so they're probably not a recent addition. Either he's done a lot of target practice or he's a combat pilot. Some pilots make it look easy, but it's anything but easy to hit the tail boom of one moving helicopter from another moving helicopter when both are moving up, down and side to side."

Marella gave him a wan smile.

"Second thing is, I think the bogey was trying to force them down." Hawke rubbed his face, noting the startled looks he drew. "If he'd wanted to kill them, he would have turned the cannon on the cockpit or the engine housing, not the tail boom or the tail rotor."

"Maybe he's not as good a shot as you made him out to be," Laban said skeptically.

"Maybe," Hawke agreed. "But they tried an autorotation and he let them. Once he wounded Angel One, he backed off. That says force down to me."

"A force down in heavy forest?" Marella didn't look convinced.

Hawke shifted in his chair. "I didn't say the bogey wished them well. Just maybe that he was sending a message."

Laban sighed heavily. "Hobart, please tell me that DI has completed the analysis of exactly what message these people are trying to send."

The man Hawke still didn't know nodded and lifted a manila file with a handful of colored stickers on it.

"I have a copy for you, sir, but it's Eyes Only. I delivered a copy to Zeus just before this meeting started."

Laban reached a hand out for the document, and looked apologetically at the rest of the team. "Any summary you can share?"

Hobart consulted his notes, frowned and bit at his lip for a moment before answering.

"The primary theory has been that the goal of these incidents is to prompt us – that is, the Firm," that said with a quick glance at Hawke, "to recover the Airwolf aircraft. A secondary theory, which is our current assessed opinion is that the combination of incidents, and the escalating violence are designed less to recover the aircraft and more indicative of a concerted effort to discredit the Firm."

"Two good people are in ICU to discredit the Firm?" Hawke said, angry, appalled.

"There's no evidence that Archangel was the primary target in this series of incidents, nor do we anticipate that they will cease," Hobart said, somewhat apologetically. "I can only say that an even partially successful attempt to kill our DDO is a major escalation of matters within a larger mêlée."

"I have no idea what you just said," Hawke said in frustration, "but I'm pretty sure I don't like it."

There were times Hawke wanted to turn Airwolf's cannon and missiles onto the politicians and bureaucrats who played games with people's lives. This was one of them. It made sense in so many ways that Washington D.C. was built on swampland.

"Hawke, I understand your frustration with that assessment," Laban said, raised eyebrows and a nod in Hawke's direction. "I promise you that if there is any tactical information in DI's analysis, I will make it available to this team." He turned his attention to Marella. "Where do we stand with our search?"

"We hit that concrete mixing plant east of Chula Vista at 0730. There's enough physical evidence to conclude that a Bell 222 was modified and painted to resemble Airwolf there, but it had been abandoned for at least three days. That's how long we were watching it."

"Who owns the plant?"

Marella's smile was strained. "The State of California. The entire property was seized for nonpayment of back taxes about a year ago."

Laban swore.

"The plotted trajectories of all interactions with this aircraft indicate it heads south after each incident. Miramar and Los Alamitos have offered full cooperation in monitoring air space."

"I hear that we have a decoy Airwolf? Were you planning a trap?"

Hawke's head spun, between Laban and Marella.

"No sir. Not a trap, per se. We were going to have the Air Force transport our decoy to Andrews AFB in a C5 under high security."

Laban rubbed his eyes. "Jesus, do you really think …" He stopped abruptly. "Sorry, didn't mean to speculate. How were you going to make it look legit?"

Marella grimaced. "We hadn't actually discussed it with Hawke yet, but obviously we'd need his cooperation to make it seem we'd actually recovered Airwolf." She turned to Hawke. "How do you feel about going to jail? Just for a few days?"

* * *

"How is he?" 

Marella glanced at Hawke. "Funny, I would have sworn your first question would be why I wasn't at the hospital."

She stood aside and let him enter her office before pushing the door closed behind her. He looked around in curiosity, had never been there before. The glass desk, computer workstation, and lack of clutter were very like Marella but he was surprised at the complete lack of personal objects; the office was impersonal, almost sterile.

"He's just out of surgery," she said, leaning against the door, watching him survey her office.

"Again? Why?"

"Internal bleeding," she answered, looking away from Hawke. "They haven't been able to stabilize his blood pressure. This is their second attempt to find the bleed." She sighed. "This might be something new or something they couldn't see last time."

It was unsettling dealing with this version of Marella, as if all emotion had been squeezed out of her and he was left with something other, something less. From a distance she'd appeared almost normal. Now, within a few feet, Hawke could see how her skin stretched tightly over her face as if every bone and muscle was clenched, a look exacerbated by the almost painfully tight way she'd pulled back her hair. A lack of sleep and time was playing havoc with her normally impeccable presentation; there were wrinkles in the white silk dress she wore and she was chewing off what little remained of her lipstick.

"I want to see Michael."

That drew her interest, but as she looked at Hawke, she frowned.

"Don't tell me it's not possible," Hawke warned.

"Why?"

Hawke tensed. He couldn't actually explain the almost overpowering urge. "He's a friend, Marella. When friends are in the hospital, you go see them." And he needed to know if Zeus was lying to him.

She shook her head. "He's in Intensive Care. They restrict visits to five minutes out of every hour and it's family only, Hawke."

He pounced. "That why you're not there?"

"No," she sighed. "I'm not there because here I can do something." She sat at her desk, pushed a pile of papers into one neat stack and tapped it on both ends, and then frowned at it. "Do you have any idea of what it's like to sit outside an ICU just _waiting_? I can't help him. I can't do anything but sit and wait. I. Can't. Do. Anything."

Grumbling, Hawke perched himself at the edge of her desk while she shifted more papers, not looking at him. He understood precisely. Neither one of them did helpless very well.

"At least here I can track down those bastards who did this. Find that stupid helicopter pretending to be Airwolf and whoever is behind this." She turned on Hawke, voice sharpening. "Why is it always Airwolf? I'm beginning to hate that helicopter."

Hawke wondered if it was a blanket statement that included Airwolf's crew. "Airwolf didn't shoot down Angel One."

"He's not a field operative or a case officer any more," she continued as if he hadn't spoken. "He's a Deputy Director. His battles are supposed to be bureaucratic or political, not…." She jerked her right hand almost spasmodically in a circle.

"Not the kind where people die," Hawke agreed softly.

She still wasn't crying; her eyes were dry, bleak landscapes of suppressed emotion, of containment. A lunar landscape held more life.

"I hate that helicopter," she repeated.

"You know it's saved his life," Hawke felt obligated to remind her.

"No." She turned to face him finally, standing and at last truly engaging. "Kruger grabbed Archangel because he knew _Airwolf_ would get him out. _That helicopter_ is the reason he lost an eye and full use of his leg. It's the reason he's in ICU _right now_."

Hawke bit his lip physically, bit his tongue figuratively.

"Do you know how many people died at Red Star?" she demanded as she moved away from her desk, circling Hawke. "Five people were killed during the attack. Three others died from their injuries."

He could see a dim spark flaring in the depths of those black pupils. Come on, he thought. Get angry. Feel the emotion.

"That was Moffet," he said blandly.

"Nineteen others were injured, six permanently disabled; they never came back to work."

"Michael went back to work. So did you."

"Yes, with steel reinforcing in four vertebrae," she spat. "It took months for the fusions to mature, rehab to strengthen my muscles, learning a different way to sit, walk, lift. And even with all the rehab he did, that he still does, Michael never recovered full function in his leg."

Hawke caught his breath. Briggs' injuries were visible and therefore known, but he'd shared no detail about Marella's.

"I didn't know," he said quietly. He waited a moment for her to accept his apology.

"Zinn was right. We should have destroyed it after Red Star. Moffet contaminated it."

"She's a helicopter, Marella," Hawke said, exasperated. "Not a landfill."

"A Mach 1 helicopter that kicks butt," she said, voice tinged with bitterness. "Except that it keeps coming back and kicking our butts. I keep a separate file tracking how many of our people have been killed or injured in Airwolf-related incidents." She looked at Hawke and he could see the misery working its way to the surface. "How many lives are required to pay for a billion dollar helicopter?"

"Michael's still alive," Hawke said, pushing Zeus' dire prognosis out of mind. "He's made it through the first twenty-four hours."

"He almost bled to death from the pelvic fracture." Marella stopped for a moment to catch her breath and Hawke could hear it waver slightly. "The chance of infection or blood clot is…"

She stopped speaking, breathing hard through her mouth as if suddenly winded.

"Still too high," Hawke conceded. "He's not out of danger." Two steps and he was standing next to her, one hand sliding around her waist to support her sudden unsteadiness as he guided her to the chair behind her desk

"I've never been this scared in my life," she whispered, voice suddenly hoarse. "I don't think he's going to live."

Her voice broke on the last word and she bent over, head towards her knees. Hyperventilation, Hawke thought, crouching next to her as Marella physically shook. One hand rubbing her back, he refrained from offering false reassurances. She wouldn't believe them anyway and she'd despise him for being trite.

"Michael's pretty stubborn," he said, finally, offering something truthful that she might cling to.

He thought for a second he elicited a laugh from the way her shoulder were quivering. He hadn't expected tears from such an innocuous statement, but it was tears finally, long overdue and welcome, in Hawke's opinion at least.

* * *

"I said I'd do it, Dom and I meant it," Hawke said into the phone, starting to lose patience. "You don't have to participate." He saw Laura exchange looks with Marella but ignored them. It would be more convincing if the FBI arrested both him and Santini but it was up to Dominic, not the Firm, if Dominic volunteered to sit in jail for a few days. 

"It'll be later today. First I'm going to pay a visit to a friend who's in the hospital."

It was the price of his cooperation and he'd been unyielding in negotiation. He'd sat in a jail cell before and it was never pleasurable but beat most days or nights he'd spent in Vietnam and a good number of the missions he'd flown for the Firm. And if it helped to smoke out the rat bastards using Airwolf against the Firm, it'd be worth it.

He'd held his questions until he and Marella were in the helicopter, en route to the hospital. There was an awkwardness between them after her tears and the silence had been heavy, like wet fog.

"Who's Zinn?"

She'd been gazing out the window, attention somewhere far away but returned almost instantly. Tapping her headset, she switched the headset channel so that it didn't match the one used by the pilots. He followed her lead; that neither of them was flying was something he'd let go unquestioned.

"You probably know him," she answered, calm confidence returning with a focus on business. "Ray Zinn helped build Airwolf."

Hawke reacted, head pulling back as his brows raised a bit. He mouthed the name, running it against his memory without finding a match.

"Ray Zinn is, or was, an avionics engineer who specialized in increasing engine potential. He designed and built Airwolf's turbos."

Another thing Moffett had taken credit for, Hawke was willing to wager.

"Is or was?"

Marella's shoulders lifted. "He hasn't been seen in almost three weeks and we've been looking. We believe he is involved, although his participation may not be wholly voluntary."

Missing during the period where the fake Airwolf had been out and about causing trouble and Zinn probably knew enough about her construction to help the mockup.

"So what did you mean that he was right and you should have destroyed Airwolf after Red Star?"

Marella sighed and glanced out the window for a moment before replying.

"Zinn was at Red Star when Moffett attacked the tower. Zinn survived but his fiancé, Jill Loring, was killed." She gave Hawke a rueful smile. "They'd met on the project. Anyway, after we…you, recovered Airwolf, Zinn started lobbying within the Firm for it to be destroyed. He said we'd created a tool that was too powerful; he even compared Airwolf to a nuclear weapon." She shook her head, clearly remembering the events. "He went too far; when no one in the Firm was willing to hear him out any more, he started lobbying Congress."

Hawke agreed; Zinn had definitely gone too far. The Firm didn't sit back when an employee started sharing dirty laundry.

"But as of three weeks ago, he was still alive?"

Marella glowered. "We're not quite as heavy handed as you make us out to be, Hawke. He was retired, classified as psychologically disabled after Red Star."

"Nice," Hawke snorted. "Get him out of the way and make sure no one else listens to him."

A shrug. "He was a loose cannon. Discrediting him was a humane and effective way of dealing with him before he became a major problem. We helped him land a job within the avionics industry, where he's been happily employed since he left the Firm."

"Until three weeks ago or so," Hawke murmured. "You think he was building this bogey we're chasing?"

"No, I don't," she answered, as frank and open as he'd heard he since the 'incidents' had started. "Not on his own anyway. And the Ray Zinn I knew would never have participated in an attack on any helicopter, even a Firm helicopter." She gave him a bittersweet smile. "At one time I would have said, _especially_ a Firm helicopter."

The helicopter flared, eased into the landing zone on the roof of the hospital.

"I thought this was Medevac choppers only."

"It is," Marella answered, quickly un-strapping her harness. "That's why we're getting dropped off. Let's go."

Hawke followed her out of the hatch, ducking automatically under the wide sweeps of the rotors as he jogged towards the door set on the other side of the roof. The Firm's helicopter was in the air before he reached it.

He followed Marella, who seemed to know her way through the labyrinthine corridors of UCLA Medical Center to the ICU. The click of her heels on the polished floors drew the attention of an older couple and a young woman in a white dress, seated in a waiting room just outside the wide double door entrance leading to Intensive Care.

Marella wore a pasted smile as she greeted the older woman with a hug and then turned back to Hawke.

"This is Hawke. He's a friend of Michael's. Hawke, this is Mrs. Hayden, Michael's mother."

Mrs. Hayden had Briggs' eyes, or rather he hers, though hers were faded and red-rimmed. Unlike her son, she dressed to emphasize the startling clear blue of her eyes with a royal blue jacket and skirt that looked to Hawke's inexpert eyes like heavy silk.

"Ma'am," he stammered, surprised. He knew Briggs had family, knew his mother was still living, but still felt as if Briggs' life outside the Firm was an alternate reality.

She smiled -- like her eyes, her smile was the same as her son's -- and there was more than a hint of South Carolina in her voice. "It's a pleasure to meet one of Michael's friends. His life is so tightly compartmentalized, I rarely get the opportunity."

"Though hardly the circumstances we'd prefer," the gray-haired man standing next to her said. He held out a hand. "Porter Hayden."

Hawke took the hand, shook it automatically. "Yes sir, I know. It's an honor and pleasure to meet you, General, Mrs. Hayden," he lied.

Who said all those hours of officer training wouldn't come in useful some day? He just hadn't expected Briggs' mother to be married to a retired Air Force general, especially one who'd held a command in Vietnam. He'd have to have a word with Marella for failing to warn him.

Still grasping his hand, Hayden nodded, as if Hawke had confirmed something expected. "You're not Air Force," he said with confidence. "I'd know you if you were."

"Army," Hawke replied, gracefully letting his hand drop. "But not for a long time."

"Pilot," said Hayden.

"Helicopters."

"Of course," Mrs. Hayden said bleakly and then shuddered.

Marella, always attuned to small cues, stepped forward. "Hawke's involved in the investigation. He'll be unavailable for the next few days and would like to visit Michael now."

It took Hawke a moment or two to realize that Marella was essentially asking permission for him to do so.

Mrs. Hayden closed her eyes, her face a mask of weariness and pain. "Yes, of course," she said, almost inaudibly. "There's been no improvement."

Her husband put his arm around her and drew her back to where they'd been sitting.

Marella tensed, swallowed and then nodded. "I know." She turned to Hawke and slipped one hand behind his elbow. "Let's go."

He had questions. He had a lot of questions, so many in fact that he didn't know where to start or whether he even wanted to go down the path of asking.

Marella stopped just before the double doors to ICU and looked at him.

"Yes, she's always that dramatic," she said in a low voice. "Michael swears it's only since she married Hayden and I'm sorry that I didn't warn you about him. I forgot you didn't know." She pushed through the doors.

Hawke would have given Briggs' mother the benefit of the doubt; her son was gravely injured and she'd traveled cross-country to sit by his bed in Intensive Care. Hayden was another story. He could see why Briggs would keep that family association private. It was obvious that Marella knew a lot about the Briggs family dynamic so he'd trust her judgment. He followed her into the hush of ICU.

There weren't any rooms with walls and a door, just areas partitioned off with curtains. The nurses on duty looked up, saw Marella and nodded. The place seemed bereft of human sounds. Everything Hawke heard was mechanical. It smelled of metal and antiseptic. If he strained, he could hear human voices at a murmur, no louder. He walked as quietly as possible, hyperconscious of making the slightest sound. No library or church ever had that much of an effect on him.

Marella held back one set of curtains; Hawke entered and saw a bed with a man in it, surrounded by equipment: monitors, pumps, tubing, lights and more monitors. Something beeped every few seconds. The man didn't even look like Archangel and Hawke turned away, realizing that they were at the wrong bed. Marella's eyes, and the distraught look in them, convinced him otherwise.

"Jesus," Hawke whispered, stalled near the foot of the bed.

Briggs looked vulnerable without his glasses. His hair, uncombed and unwashed, looked darker than normal against skin that was the translucent gray-white of skim milk. Familiar features were partially obscured by bruises, abrasions and tubing; the nasogastric tube disappearing into his left nostril and the ventilator tube held in position at his mouth masked his mustache.

Hawke made his way forward, slowly, studying the heavy stillness of a body that lacked Briggs' restless energy, his sheer presence. Aside from the sickly pallor of his skin and a number of ugly gashes and abrasions, there was no obvert trauma, no visible basis for the grim prognosis Zeus had delivered.

Multiple fractures, internal injuries, Zeus had said. Marella had spoken of a pelvic fracture. Under the chest high blanket, Hawke saw the outline of a cast or brace or something on Briggs' right thigh and a metal bar or brace across his hips tenting the blanket up at least an inch. Tubes snaking out from under the blanket were probably drains.

Moving to his left, to Briggs' right, Hawke could avoid most of the tubing. Careful not to get tangled in the IV, he touched Briggs' arm, surprised and relieved to find it warm.

"Michael," he said, adopting a hushed tone appropriate to the environment.

Marella slipped inside the curtains. "He's in and out of consciousness," she said quietly. "And even when he's awake…."

She trailed off and Hawke glanced at her, saw the crushing worry in her face.

"He's very weak," she said.

Hawke crouched next to the bed, shifted his hand to Briggs' shoulder. Briggs wasn't awake; his right eyelid was closed and unexpectedly long eyelashes cast a shadow on his right cheekbone. There was a familiar but not particularly welcome scent that Hawke recognized from his own hospital stays: an odd blend of sweetness and antiseptic as if the pores of the body were excreting all the drugs and fluids being pumped into it.

"Michael, it's Hawke. I'm sure Marella has told you this already but you're safe, you're in a world class hospital and you're going to be okay."

The ventilator pump hissed; Briggs' chest rose and fell as an oxygen mixture was forced into his lungs. Other than that, there was no movement, no reaction from the bed.

Marella looked as if she might start crying again. Hawke tried to think of what he'd want to know if he were the one lying in ICU.

"There's a pretty smart group of people dedicated to finding the folks who attacked you. Marella's involved, so am I, and you know neither of us are all that patient or forgiving. We'll find those bastards."

Hawke tightened his grip on Briggs' shoulder.

"Your job is to just keep breathing, buddy. Give your body time to recover, let it start healing. The doctors will do the rest."

He stayed in the crouch, one hand on Briggs for a while. It was the closest he'd come to praying in a long time and he wasn't expecting an answer. The continued hiss of the ventilator and the beep of the heart monitor were as good as he could expect right now.

He felt Marella's hand on his back, looked up at her and read in her face that it was time to go. He awkwardly patted Briggs and consciously refused to say goodbye.

"See you later, Michael."

Marella lingered for a moment, inside the curtains. Glancing back, Hawke could see her finger-combing Briggs' hair into some semblance of his normal style.

He made it to the doors leading out of ICU before he started swearing in a low voice.


	9. Chapter 9

"Don't shoot, I give up," Hawke said laconically. Sprawled in a chair, feet up on the counter, he was the picture of indifference.

The lead FBI Agent scowled at him and dropped the warrant on the counter near Hawke's feet. None of the Agents had drawn their weapons. As arrests went, it was fairly businesslike, though the FBI had traded suit jackets for the blue windbreakers they preferred to use in the field.

"We have a warrant to search these premises," Agent Hammond said, obviously irritated by Hawke's cavalier attitude.

"Go right ahead," Santini said, spreading his arms to embrace the entire hangar, offices and storage rooms of Santini Air. "If you happen to find any loose change, feel free to keep it, government salaries being what they are."

The peals of laughter that followed were not going to endear them to the Feds and Hawke tucked his chin down, rubbed an eyebrow to hide his smile from Hammond. He didn't hide it from Marella, who rolled her eyes at Santini.

She made herself comfortable in a chair pulled out from behind the counter. Giving the FBI the chance to arrest Hawke and Santini was more than just a bone tossed to their friends at the Bureau; it was a dream come true for Hammond and any number of agents in the L.A. Branch. A dream that was going to be a lot more short-lived than any of them realized. She crossed her legs; might as well let them savor the search of the premises at least.

Marella signaled, subtly, to the team she'd brought with her to shadow the agents combing the hangar. Hawke and Santini had been given more than adequate notice to remove anything they didn't want found, and the warrant was specific and limited, but she didn't want any unexpected complications.

"Coffee?" Santini popped up behind her, pot in hand, grinning unrepentantly.

Marella shook her head, partly in reply and partly in disapproval.

"Michael?" he asked, voice and expression concerned.

"No change."

"Ah," he sighed. "For what it's worth, I lit a few candles earlier at St. Elisabeth's."

It was worth a lot and Marella blinked away sudden tears. "Thank you," she said, a little hoarsely. "Now go sit down. I'm supposed to be making sure you and Hawke don't make a run for it." But she smiled at him to soften her words and he understood.

"Tell me again why we're doing this," Santini said to Hawke.

Hawke looked at Marella and she shook her head, almost imperceptibly. Not here.

"Because the government misplaced one of their aircraft and they think we have something to do with it," Hawke replied, with a loud and impatient exhale.

"For what the government pays for its aircraft, I can see why they might be a little grouchy when one goes missing," Santini said, with another belly laugh. "Hey, I got a toilet seat in there you can buy for $500.00!"

Marella shook her head, lips tightening. Dominic was Dominic, but she just wasn't in the mood and he was antagonizing the FBI Agents far more than necessary or smart. She saw Hawke's sharp elbow, Santini's mouth open to reply and then close, his gaze following Hawke's in her direction. He shrugged and mouthed 'Sorry.'

Hammond exited the office and pulled a set of handcuffs from his belt. He dangled them in front of Hawke, the keen pleasure of a satisfied predator lighting his face.

"Stringfellow Hawke, I have a warrant for your arrest, charging you with theft of government property. Stand up and keep your hands where I can see them."

Hawke climbed to his feet slowly and brushed down his jeans before complying. Jaw set, his eyes and disgruntled expression made clear his contempt for the proceedings.

"Don't forget to read me my rights," he said to Hammond, extending his arms to be cuffed. "Wouldn't want my lawyer embarrassing you for screwing up the arrest like a rookie."

Marella held back a sigh and rose to her feet. "Are we through here, Agent Hammond?" she asked pointedly.

"Yes, ma'am," he said, as he snapped the handcuffs around Hawke's wrists. "The helicopter is not on the premise but my team will find any evidence of it here."

Which meant they'd find nothing at all.

"Not to worry, Special Agent," she assured him. "We have a very good idea where it is."

Hawke's eyes flickered to her as Hammond began Mirandizing him. She could have sworn there was more than a glimmer of worry there. There should be, she thought as she turned on her heel and walked out of the hangar. Archangel's third tracer had worked exactly as he'd intended. She knew the location of Airwolf's Lair within a few hundred yards. She just hadn't decided what she wanted to do with that knowledge.

In the meantime, she had calls to make and some bait to dangle. Entering the white stretch Lincoln, she nodded to the driver. "Back to the office please, Henry."

Extracting a business card from her briefcase, she picked up the car phone and dialed the number on the card.

"Agnes Dudley, please," she requested in a pleasant, professional tone. "Ms. Dudley, my name is Marella White and I was referred to you by a mutual friend." She forced herself to smile, to send the smile through the phone when it was the last possible thing she felt. "Yes, that's the one."

* * *

"The C5 is scheduled for touchdown at 0450 Eastern Standard Time," Laura reported, turning from her position in front of the computer monitor as Marella entered Archangel's office. 

"You know, it takes real balls to land and store that decoy at Andrews," Labon said, shaking his head but smiling as he leaned back in his chair. "Hiding something in plain sight, or in this case, in your adversary's back yard sounds like pure Archangel. I assume that placement was his idea."

"Yes, sir," Laura confirmed, a little tightly, her eyes catching Marella's.

Marella held her glance without flinching. Labon wasn't insensitive and he wasn't stupid. She refused to react, emotionally or otherwise, every time Archangel's name was mentioned.

"I wish we hadn't pulled Ferenc out when we did," Labon mused.

Marella's widening eyes had Laban backpedaling almost immediately.

"I know. It was my call, my people were running him, and I stand by it," he said, raising his hands in surrender. "The risk was too great to leave him in place, and I truly appreciate how quickly you arranged for his extraction." He gave a regretful shrug. "I'd just like to have an additional source for independent confirmation. Any reports yet on his debrief?"

Marella shook her head. It was far too early to gain anything new from Ferenc, and Labon knew that.

"We have a lead on Ray Zinn," she said. "Positive and recent identification in La Presa, not far from San Diego. We have two teams there now, three more en route."

"You think he'll still be in the area?" Labon didn't look convinced. "That border is pretty porous."

"He was seen in the company of two other men, neither of whom we've been able to identify; he may not exactly be at liberty. There's an APB out for Zinn throughout California, Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico and Utah and of course at all border crossings." She smiled wryly. "Official border crossings, that is."

Labon rubbed his mouth. "If Zinn is still in the San Diego area, then our fake Airwolf is probably nearby."

Marella had brought a map with her for that reason and she spread it on Archangel's desk, in front of Labon. "Here's Chula Vista," she said, lacquered fingernail tapping at the tiny letters on the map. "Just to the east is the concrete mixing factory where we found evidence of modifications to a helicopter to make it look like Airwolf. Here," her finger stabbed again, "just northeast of that location is La Presa."

Labon leaned over the map. "What's this area here? It doesn't look very developed."

Marella smiled grimly. "Sweetwater Reservoir, Coon Canyon and the Jamacha Valley. Just south is Wild Mans Canyon. Further southeast is Proctor Valley."

"Good place to hide a helicopter," Laban said.

"With a camouflage net, it could be anywhere in there," she agreed with a heavy sigh. "Here's our dilemma. Running an effective search pattern in those mountains could take weeks and a significant amount of Firm resources, both human and aircraft, and may just spook our prey rather than locate it."

"What about satellite imagery?"

"That is an option," Marella replied, cautiously, "but we need real time targeted images that can be translated into actionable information. Usually there's a delay getting the images from NOAA, NASA or DOD."

Laban raised his eyebrows. "You have something else in mind."

"Airwolf," Laura said softly from across the room.

Marella nodded. "Airwolf's onboard tactical computer is capable of scanning for specific aircraft types. With that, and its infrared imagery capability, we could perform a much more effective search of that area."

"Isn't that type of tactical information and scanning available elsewhere?"

"Yes, sir. The Air Force has RC-135s, U-2s, and SR-71s. The Navy has P-3s. CIA has its own surveillance and imagery aircraft."

"And the Firm has Airwolf," Laban said. "Or at least one Airwolf." He sat back in his chair and studied her for a long moment. Steepling his fingers, he frowned. "Assuming we had access to our one and only Airwolf, which we do not presently, its appearance would completely undermine Operation RATTRAP."

"Yes, sir," Marella agreed. "That's our dilemma."

"Even if you used it at night with stealth settings, you'd have to pull Hawke and Santini out of jail to get access," Laban said quietly, as if he was speaking to himself.

There was a moment where Marella almost contradicted him, where the knowledge of Airwolf's general location was burning a hole in her pocket and she felt she must pull it out and share it. She let the moment pass; Caitlin O'Shannessy had not been seen since Airwolf returned from its Hungarian mission and Marella had learned early in her career that there were no coincidences in her business. Hawke's cooperation had been bought too easily; he hadn't left himself or Airwolf exposed.

"You, all of you, Archangel and his immediate staff, have gone to a lot of trouble to set up our mole. The Airwolf decoy, the C5 transport, arresting Hawke and Santini, everything's in play."

"Yes, sir," Marella said again.

"When did we get this lead on Zinn?" he asked.

"An hour ago."

Labon nodded, as if he had expected the answer, or at least the recent hour of the lead.

"Run it down and take whatever resources you need, except Airwolf." He leaned forward, looking hard at Marella and then Laura. "I want to find Zinn and that helicopter, as much as you do. Archangel and I have been friends for fifteen years." He set his jaw. "I want an hour in a locked room – _alone_ -- with the pilot who shot down his helicopter once we find the son-of-a-bitch. But I won't scuttle a CI operation, and especially not one this important, out of a sense of vengeance."

Marella had expected nothing else. She simply nodded.

"I'll get you the satellite imagery. Put a net around that area and make sure that Zinn and his partners don't get out of it."

"Yes, sir."

Laura trailed after her as she exited the room.

"RATTRAP?" Marella asked, scrunching up her nose once they were far enough from Archangel's office that Laban wouldn't overhear.

Laura winced. "Not my call," she said with emphasis. "It beats Operation Rotten Apple…"

"But not by much," they said simultaneously and then shared tired smiles.

"It's compartmentalized," Laura said. "Zeus, Laban, Thor, Hobart and the two of us know the overall operation. Everyone else just knows his or her individual piece."

Archangel knows, Marella thought, but he's not telling anyone.

"Why bother? The op name's a dead giveaway."

Laura sighed. "I know. You want me to run things down in San Diego?"

"Is it still Thursday?" Marella asked, before glancing at her watch. Almost ten at night and she'd been going non-stop since Wednesday at 0630. She'd been on her feet for about forty hours; twenty-eight of them in crisis mode after word reached her of Angel One's crash. "Anything new from the hospital?"

"No change," Laura said. "The specialists Zeus brought in said it could be days or even weeks before there's any real improvement. The important thing is to keep them…."

"Stable," Marella finished. There were benefits to having completed her medical degree. Understanding both the actual and the potential consequences of specific life-threatening injuries to someone she loved was not something she considered a benefit right now; there was much to be said for ignorance. She met Laura's gaze. "The doctors haven't been able to stabilize Archangel's blood pressure."

"No, they haven't," Laura agreed in a somber tone. "Henry took Archangel's parents home for the night about an hour ago."

At Marella's arched brow, Laura corrected herself.

"Henry took Archangel's mother and stepfather back to his house. Amanda, Jude and Vanessa have been taking shifts at the hospital and providing any necessary support to General and Mrs. Hayden. We have a nurse from our own clinic in ICU each shift along with someone from security."

Marella nodded, lost in thought. She knew that last part; she'd ordered it before Laban had been named. Someone needed to fly down to La Presa and organize a massive search of the mountainous area just south of it, coordinating it with the FBI, the local Sheriff's department and possibly the Border Patrol. Otherwise known as an administrative nightmare. She could do it. She'd be less than two hours away and there was no reason not to go. There'd been no change in Archangel's condition since his last surgery. Speaking of which, they really needed Amanda back at the office to cover some of the non-Airwolf related operations. She made a mental note to tag a junior staffer for hospital and Hayden babysitting duty.

"You haven't had any sleep, have you?" Laura's gaze was perceptive and sympathetic. "I caught about three hours earlier today. How about I get things organized in La Presa?"

Marella smiled. "I'm trying to come up with a reason why I should go, but I'm too tired to think of anything."

The concession cost her nothing but reinforced a sense of camaraderie, of shared experience with Laura, useful if only to alleviate the sometimes prickly relationship between them; Laura's ambition clashing against Marella's more senior position and favored status.

"I promise I'll stretch out on the couch in my office if you'll call me in three hours."

"Of course," Laura agreed, a little too quickly.

"Three hours," Marella said firmly.

It was six hours before the phone rang and Marella stumbled off of the couch towards the desk, groping for the phone.

"Yes?"

"Marella, it's Amanda at the hospital. I'm sorry if I woke you but…"

There wasn't really a pause in Amanda's report but in the infinitesimal second before the other woman continued speaking, Marella felt her heart freeze in her chest.

"…Karen Allenden was just rushed off to surgery. She coded." Amanda, possibly the least perturbable of Archangel's staff sounded shaken. "One of the nurses told me that they think it's a pulmonary embolism."

"She coded?" Marella repeated blearily as she turned on her desk lamp and squinted painfully against the sudden onslaught of light. She almost said, 'that's bad,' which would have been stating the godawful obvious. Her higher brain functions were waking much more slowly that her speech ability.

"They resuscitated her. Good thing Rich wasn't here when it happened. He went out to buy cigarettes and coffee about twenty minutes ago. I'm going to look for him but wanted to report in first."

Air Force Major Richard Allenden, Karen's husband of seven months. Marella's entire body shuddered in sympathy. She wondered if there was anyone at DOD or the Air Force that she should call to let them know Karen's status and then remembered it was only 0400.

"All right," Marella said, in a voice that sounded a lot more composed than she felt. "Just keep me posted." She willed herself to ask, "Archangel?"

"No change. Sorry."


	10. Chapter 10

"You said two days," Santini said for the third, or eighth or perhaps the twentieth time. Hawke had lost count and as Santini was pacing, he might have said it to the walls of the cell they shared without Hawke hearing or while Hawke was asleep.

"Yeah."

"Tell me why we agreed to do this again."

Hawke sighed. "We cooperate, Archangel's people get us out after a few days, long enough to make it look real. We don't cooperate, they arrest us anyway and we can rot in here for all they care."

"We should've just stayed at the Lair. They would've had to find us first."

"And it helps the Firm find the bastards who shot down Archangel's helicopter."

At least they were sharing a cell. After their arrest on Thursday, they'd been separated, as if the FBI thought they'd get a different story that way. Two nights in a cell by himself was anything but a hardship for Hawke but he was sure Dominic had been lonely. He wasn't sure if the Feds had changed tactics or why, but after the previous day's questioning, Hawke had been led back to Santini's cell, much to the old man's delight.

"It's Sunday if you hadn't noticed," Santini grumbled. "Thursday night they arrested us, and it's Sunday. That's a lot more than two days."

The bunks were almost comfortable, though the mattresses were thinner than most and the pillows nothing but a narrow slice of cushion, but they were clean and better than a lot of places Hawke had slept. And they were a lot more comfortable than sitting in the hard plastic chairs enduring question after question from FBI Agents and a number of people in dark suits who didn't identify themselves. Hawke sighed and shifted position on his bunk. He wished Dominic would settle down and put his feet up.

"Guess they didn't catch their prey yet," Hawke said, tamping down on his own impatience. Fishing taught a man patience. Stillness and patience were what the fisherman brought to the hunt, along with the right bait. The Firm had the bait; it remained to be seen if they had the patience to wait out their prey.

"Maybe we should call a lawyer," Santini suggested for at least the tenth time.

"On a Sunday."

"Yeah, on a Sunday! You think Sam Hobbes don't work Sundays?"

"He might, but I doubt he works Federal court," Hawke snorted. "This is a bit more than a speeding ticket."

"Yeah," Santini admitted with a heavy sigh. He sat, finally, on the bunk across from Hawke's, scratching his head. "How come you think Marella's not running things? I thought she was Archangel's number two."

Hawke turned his head towards Santini, frowned. "I don't know, Dom. Could be that she's the wrong level in the bureaucracy to officially be an Acting Deputy Director." He shrugged. "I think it's one thing to leave her in charge when it's short term, but this isn't short term."

Santini's paw of a hand covered the bottom of his face as he rubbed his mouth, hiding an expression Hawke could see anyway. "You think… you don't think Archangel… you said Zeus told you…"

Hawke sat up and swung his feet to the floor, sorting through what he'd been told and what he'd seen. "I think if he pulls through he's going to be out of commission for a long time and I think Zeus knew that when he picked Laban."

A reverberating clang of metal on metal echoed from somewhere down the hallway; Hawke sighed and muttered, "Here they come again."

"Maybe it's not for us this time," Santini suggested hopefully. "Maybe they're just bringing someone else in or out."

Hawke just looked at him.

"Okay, okay," Santini said with a smile, holding up his hands. "A man can dream, can't he?"

"You need a better setting for those dreams, Dom," Hawke said with a small smile.

The number of footfalls told him it was a small crowd coming down the hallway, which was a change from the single guard. Hawke stood and stretched, arms straight over his head, and then tilted his head side to side to work out the kinks. The first interrogation team had handcuffed him to the chair, the second team had removed the handcuffs, the third team had provided better than average coffee. It was like something out of Goldilocks and the Three Bears. Hawke kept his smile inside; Caitlin would never believe he'd come up with that analogy.

The parade stopped in front of their cell and Hawke shot Santini an "I told you so" glance that bounced off the other man. Hawke studied his visitors: the guard who had brought breakfast; Special Agent Hammond, looking decidedly irritated; and an older women, maybe Dominic's age, and less fortunately, his build, whose eyes raked them assessingly through silver rimmed eyeglasses.

"I want to call my lawyer," Santini said loudly, standing and folding his arms across his chest defiantly.

"No need for that Mr. Santini," the woman said in a gravelly voice. "Your attorney has arrived." She glanced at their jumpsuits with distaste and then turned to Hammond. "I'd like to speak privately with my clients while you have someone retrieve their clothing and personal possessions and start the out-processing."

Hawke looked at Santini, who was blinking his surprise, mouth slightly open as if stunned into silence. The guard unlocked the cell door and swung it open; the woman entered and then turned to Hammond. "I did say privately, did I not?"

Hammond mumbled something and then turned away, trailed by the guard. The female force of nature turned her attention on her very surprised clients. A hand shot out from the end of a gray worsted sleeve, which was attached to a gray worsted suit jacket, which matched her gray worsted skirt. Even the best of tailoring failed to make her look unlike a small gray tank.

"Gentlemen, my name is Agnes Dudley and I've been hired to represent you."

Hawke met her hand, a firm handshake, confident but not challenging. "Lady, I don't know you from Adam, but I admire anyone who marches in here and stirs things up like you have."

Santini shook her hand eagerly. "You said out-processing. That means you're getting us out of here?"

She smiled. "Yes, Mr. Santini. You and Mr. Hawke will be released shortly. I'm afraid there is a bit of paperwork to be performed but you should be out of here by lunchtime." A sharp gaze scanned them, noted the absence of wristwatches. "It's approximately 10:30 AM right now. The out-processing will probably take an hour. Questions?"

"Yes," Hawke said immediately. "Who hired you?"

"Let's just say that you gentleman have a guardian angel, shall we?" Ms. Dudley said with a conspiratorial smile.

Hawke exchanged a look with Santini.

"Then what took so long?" Santini demanded. "We were supposed to be here for two days only."

"That," she said, " is something for you to discuss with the person who hired me. Over lunch, if all goes as expected."

She looked around, and Santini conscious of his manners gestured to his bunk. "Would you like to have a seat?"

She sat and looked at Hawke expectantly.

"How'd you get us out on a Sunday?" he asked, sitting on his own bunk with a sigh. "I figured we were here through tomorrow for sure. Aren't the courts closed?"

"It's all in who you know, Mr. Hawke. It took a little time to have the arrest warrant thrown out by a judge, I grant you, and there was an obstacle that my client will discuss with you at lunch…"

"I thought we were your clients," Hawke interrupted.

Dudley smiled. "I mean the client paying the bills, as opposed to the ones I represent. That particular client would prefer to remain anonymous to law enforcement and other government agencies. I expect you will understand why."

"Uh-huh," Hawke said. "When did she hire you?"

"Thursday evening, or perhaps night, depending upon where you draw the distinction."

Hawke noted without surprise that she hadn't corrected his choice of pronoun.

"It took you three days to get us out?" Santini said suspiciously.

Dudley shook her head. "It took me less than a day, Mr. Santini. My instructions were to act as your attorney if you had not been released from custody by noon Saturday. Yesterday. My client," she smiled, "the paying one, apparently anticipated that there might be an obstacle to your timely release, correctly as it turned out."

"I think I know the name of that obstacle," Hawke growled.

"I imagine that you do."

They sat for a few moments in silence, Hawke brooding upon the double-dealings within the Firm, and simultaneously grateful for Marella's contingency planning.

"You had the warrants thrown out?" Hawke said finally. "What's stopping them from just getting a new warrant?"

"A distinct lack of evidence," Dudley said, looking a bit smug. "It's obvious that whomever wanted you arrested hand-picked the judge who signed the original warrant, and applied considerable political pressure to get it signed. The Ninth Circuit isn't that large, gentlemen. I doubt any judge in it will grant a warrant after Judge Tepper tossed this one out."

Hawke leaned forward. "Who are you, lady?" he asked, impressed despite himself.

"I'm your attorney, Agnes Dudley," the small gray tank answered with an impish grin.

Twenty minutes for their clothing, another fifty minutes for Ms. Dudley to badger the paperwork through and Hawke and Santini were free men, standing at the top of a daunting set of marble steps, belatedly remembering they hadn't arranged a ride home.

"Guess we could call a cab," Santini suggested without enthusiasm.

"You've already done so," said their lawyer, coming up behind them. "That cab waiting at the base of the stairs is yours and the fare has already been paid."

"You've got everything covered," said Hawke, half-impressed, half-suspicious.

"I think you'll find that I've played my part already," Dudley said. "The rest is out of my hands."

"Great," Santini groused.

"I have a feeling that this is more of Ms. Dudley's paying client remaining anonymous," Hawke said, and then turned to her and held out his hand. "You've restored my faith in the legal system, Ms. Dudley, and that was no small job. Thanks."

She shook his hand firmly, and then Santini's. "Stay out of trouble, please. Your friends have only so much pull."

Watching as she strode down the steps, Santini looked hurt. "I thought she liked us."

Hawke shook his head and tugged Santini down to the cab, peered in the window at the driver. "You waiting for us?"

The driver tore his attention away from the newspaper he was reading and sized up Hawke. "Yeah, I'm your ride. Hop in." He tossed the newspaper on the passenger seat and started the engine as Hawke and Santini climbed into the back.

"You know where you're going or you need directions to the airfield?"

The cabbie's backward glance was to check the traffic and he spared Hawke only a brief look. "I got directions, but it's not the airfield. Don't worry. It's where most guys go when they get out of jail." He pulled out of the parking space and smoothly into traffic that was surprisingly heavy for a Sunday around noon.

Hawke exchanged a glance with Santini and shrugged. "We don't like it, we can leave," he said quietly.

The driver took them away from the courts, out of the business district and into an area where the businesses were one or two story buildings. Hawke wasn't all that surprised when they pulled up in front of a bar.

"Smithy's?" Dominic asked.

It had a settled-in look as if it had been in place, unchanged, for a long time. Hawke scanned the parking lot. The cars were a mixed bag, mostly sedans and more than a few station wagons, with a few old junkers thrown in the mix. A neighborhood place, he decided.

"Here," the cabbie said, extending his hand over the front seat. "I'm supposed to give you this."

Hawke waited to open the sealed envelope until the cabbie had pulled away and he and Santini were on their way into the establishment.

"Says we're supposed to go in, head towards the men's room. There's a back door near the kitchen."

"A little too much cloak and dagger for me," Santini complained.

"Yeah."

Hawke walked into the bar, into a wall of cigarette smoke, the blare of televisions turned up too loud and yet still drowned out by the roar of conversation at the bar and at the tables to the left. He winced and pushed through the crowd, waving off the hostess with a promise that they were headed to the bar and by the way, where's the men's room? The small hallway at the back ran along the kitchen wall, the noise and heat seeped through the flimsy paneling, and it was a relief to push open the back door and emerge into air that was only soured by the trash bins.

A late model red sedan with sporty lines sat just at the end of the alley. Hawke climbed in the front passenger seat, ignoring Santini's protests about the back seat and eyed their driver.

"This," he nodded towards the bar, "really necessary?"

"Zeus is looking for you," Marella said as she shifted into first gear and exited the parking lot. "Actually, he's looking for Airwolf but he was counting on you being in a secure place while he does."

"And you don't want him knowing you had anything to do with getting us released."

"It would be a career limiting move," she agreed with a grimace.

Hawke stretched out. The inside of the car was more spacious than it appeared from the exterior and it was a lot nicer than anything he drove.

"Thanks for siccing that bulldog on the Feds for us," Santini said, leaning on the back of Hawke's seat.

Marella laughed. "Only you'd call retired Federal Judge a bulldog."

"Judge?" Hawke and Santini said simultaneously.

"She's a retired Federal Circuit Court Judge. Handled a lot of high profile cases. She retired about five years ago, got bored and started up private practice again three years ago. Judge Dudley's selective about her cases. She doesn't have to take everything that comes in the door."

"Uh-huh," Hawke said with a glance towards Santini in the back seat. "How'd you get her to take us on?"

Santini was looking around the inside of the car, fingering the leather upholstery, making approving faces.

"She owes Archangel a favor," Marella replied with a small smile, eyes never straying from the road.

"Speaking of which…" Santini piped up.

Hawke saw the smile vanish instantly; her knuckles tighten on the steering wheel.

"He's still in critical condition," Marella said with what sounded like a practiced absence of emotion. "We're transporting him to our clinic today."

"He strong enough for that?" Hawke asked, doubt evident in his voice.

"Zeus's orders. He is concerned that Archangel is vulnerable at the hospital and he's right. We can't protect him there."

"He need protection?" Santini asked.

"Something happened," Hawke said flatly.

"An intruder in ICU. An intruder that ran like hell when our security tried to stop him but dropped a syringe full of morphine."

"You think he was after Michael?"

"No idea, but we're not taking the chance." She bit her lip, downshifting and concentrating on the traffic. "He's a little stronger. They're weaning him off the ventilator."

"How come he wasn't taken there in the first place?"

"The paramedics made the call. UCLA is a Level One Trauma Center. They have specialists and treatment options that we just can't match and we're not too proud to go to the experts when we need them."

Hawke raised an eyebrow at her defensiveness and then considered whether she was really defending the clinic. It was clear they'd touched a nerve that was already strained. He arched back against the lumbar support in the front passenger seat. "Nice car. You allowed to drive something that isn't white?"

"Our personal vehicles are whatever we want them to be."

"Red suits you," Hawke said, pleased at the half-smile he elicited. "Our lawyer said something about lunch? And you answering a lot of questions?"

"Five minutes. Steaks at Roydon's and I'll answer all of the questions that I can." She spared a glance in Hawke's direction. "Roydon's has an excellent mahi-mahi."

"Now you're talking," Santini beamed.

"That's dolphin, Dom," Hawke said, not bothering to hide his amusement at Santini's stricken expression.

"Not like Flipper," Marella said. "It's dolphin fish, dorado, not porpoise."

"Right," Santini said doubtfully. "The steaks are steak, aren't they?"

"USDA Prime," Marella said cheerfully.

The red car darted quickly through traffic without drawing undue attention but Hawke noticed Marella checking her rear view mirror more than necessary for normal driving.

"We have a tail?"

She shook her head. "Just making sure."

Hawke saw Royden's Steak House on the right and opened his mouth in surprise when Marella passed it by without even slowing. She flipped on the directional and he held his tongue. Taking the second right after the restaurant, she backtracked several blocks and pulled into the rear parking lot of the restaurant, tucking her car between a Cadillac and Crown Vic, both of which dwarfed her little foreign sedan.

"I'm starting to feel like you don't want to be seen with us in public," Hawke said, letting humor twist his lips enough to soften his words.

"Nothing personal," she said, with a wry smile, "but right this minute, I would rather not be seen with you in public."

They followed her into the back door of the restaurant and directly to a booth, surprisingly not in the back, but tucked in a corner with good sightlines. It was clear she'd been there before or had scoped the restaurant beforehand. Food ordered, drink in hands, Hawke leaned back and scanned the restaurant. The bulk of the patrons had been seated in the front and their corner booth was not aligned in a row with other booths. They probably had a ten-foot buffer zone between them and anyone else. Archangel and Marella rarely used tradecraft around them but Hawke conceded, without much surprise, that they probably knew what they were doing.

Marella gave a tight smile. "The food's ordered. Time for the Q&A portion."

"How about a briefing to start?"

She nodded. "Okay." She paused and looked lost for a moment. "God, I don't even know where to start."

"Start with the bogus Airwolf. Who's flying it and why."

She reached for her wine glass and took a small sip. "I don't know who. While Ray Zinn is involved, we don't believe he's flying the helicopter, but the who is directly linked to the why."

"Which is?" Santini demanded.

"Politics," Hawke spat. "To discredit the Firm."

"_Not_ politics," Marella said firmly. "At least not what you think. There are some details I can't share…"

"Can't or won't?"

"Both. Can't because it's a matter of national security and won't because it's a matter of national security, and because I'm neither an idiot nor a traitor."

Hawke set his jaw and gave her a disgruntled look.

"There is an ally of the United States," she said slowly in a low voice, "an ally who shall remain unnamed with whom we have cooperated on a number of operations over the years and with whom we have a policy of sharing some intelligence." Her brow furrowed. "Not raw data, but some analysis and reports."

Hawke nodded and Santini leaned forward.

"It is the Firm's opinion that over the past few years, the national intelligence agency of this particular ally has been penetrated by Soviet Intelligence to the point that it is severely if not completely compromised."

She stopped talking abruptly and leaned back to allow their waiter to place a basket of bread on the table along with their salads. Nodding politely, Marella waited until the waiter had retreated before continuing.

"Our opinion is by no means unanimous among our nation's intelligence agencies, though we have presented hard evidence and are making progress in the re-evaluation of U.S. policies. Our ally," she said carefully, "is aware of our position and is strongly refuting it. It would help their cause considerably if the Firm's reputation was damaged, if we were discredited to the point where our opinions lacked weight." She chewed at her lip before raising eyes back to meet theirs. "Airwolf is the Firm's Achilles heel. Moffett's theft and our inability to recover her is ammunition that can, and we believe is, being used against us."

Hawke devoured his slice of bread and digested the details of her summary. Marella pushed her fork around in her salad, distractedly separating its components into sections but not eating a bit of it.

"You think that Soviet Intelligence and this other intelligence agency mocked-up an Airwolf to make the Firm look bad."

"To discredit us, yes," she agreed. "And it's working. Not only can't we recover Airwolf, but we haven't been able to find and stop this bogus Airwolf."

"They went after Michael on purpose then? It wasn't coincidence."

"In retrospect, we can see why he was a particular target," she said unhappily. "Archangel heads up the Airwolf project. His division produced the evidence that raised the issue about the agency being compromised and he pushed it with the Committee and the NSC. Our inability to protect our own Deputy Director just makes us look even more ineffective than we already did, and it's hell on morale."

"_Porca miseria_, "Santini said in a low voice.

Hawke raised an eyebrow. "Isn't that blasphemous?"

"No," Santini said, shaking his head with disgust at Hawke's continued illiteracy in Italian. "That's the other one." He waved a hand at Marella to continue. "So this so-called ally of ours sent this fake Airwolf to discredit the Firm. You're trying to find the helicopter and the guys who are flying her. What's that have to do with us going to jail to convince someone that you recovered Airwolf?"

"Your trap work?" Hawke asked.

"Not yet," she confessed. "But I said two days and besides, I think we need you and Airwolf to help track down our bogey. I hope the arrest was enough."

Marella sipped at her wine, Hawke at his beer as the waiter delivered their meals. He winced as Santini cut into his steak, red and bloody.

"I still don't understand," Santini said, waiving a piece of steak on his fork, "what was the point of us sitting in jail."

"Think of it as a two-part operation," Marella said, applying her steak knife with surgical precision to the cut of beef in front of her. "We've suspected for some time that this particular ally, or perhaps the people who'd penetrated that ally's agency, had someone inside the Firm."

"Feeding them information about how the Firm suspected they'd been compromised," Hawke said.

Marella's eyes narrowed and she nodded. "Yes, and the details of our response to their operation they're running against us right now."

"Someone in a position to know what's going on?" Santini said, startled. "_Madonne._"

"Michael met with the Committee?"

"He was trying to get the Committee not to react to the provocation of this bogus Airwolf. Zeus agreed with his argument, others didn't."

"So they made sure the next incident was something the Firm couldn't ignore," Hawke said, and then rubbed a hand through his hair. He thought of Briggs in Intensive Care. "Christ."

"Now that was blasphemous," Santini chided. "So explain to me why we went to jail."

"To set a trap," Hawke said. "If it was thought that the Firm recovered Airwolf, the bogus Airwolf wouldn't be effective any more."

"Well, in theory," Marella allowed. "The two-part operation was to draw out the inside person using our decoy Airwolf as bait, while at the same time finding and grounding the bogus Airwolf. So far, neither has been successful."

"You should try fishing. Learn some patience," Hawke said.

"You think the person, that spy or whatever inside the Firm is going to try to steal your decoy Airwolf?" Santini asked, confusion all over his face.

"Nothing that complicated. But he or she would want to alert whomever's running them that we'd recovered Airwolf, that their operation had to be retooled, and then we'd identify him or her."

"And you're gonna know that, how?" Hawke asked.

Marella smiled and Hawke concluded that maybe he didn't need to teach her how to hunt or fish.

"That's one of the details that I won't share."

He watched her devour the steak with an eagerness that suggested that she hadn't eaten properly in days. She probably hadn't, he decided. Or slept. At least she had made it home at some point to change clothes at least once since he'd seen her last, though tension was still resident in every muscle of her body. He focused on his sea bass and let her finish her meal.

"You want Airwolf to track down this bogey," Hawke said quietly after setting down his knife and fork and pushing the empty plate away.

"We should've been doing that from the beginning," Santini exclaimed, conveniently forgetting his emphatic declaration that running a business took priority.

"We've got a target area, east of San Diego," Marella said. "We've been running a search in the area since about midnight Thursday, early Friday morning. Joint effort with the Feds and the local Sheriff's department, but no luck. We've got spotters surrounding it. The bogey hasn't left the area. We think it's still in there."

Hawke leaned back, away from the table. "You want us to take Airwolf and search for this bogey with the FBI? Our lawyer got the warrant tossed because of lack of evidence. We show up in Airwolf, that's all the evidence they need."

"Only if they see _you_, which they won't," she argued. "You use Airwolf's tactical database and sensors to scan for a Bell 222 and notify us when you find it. You never touch down, never get out. The FBI sees Airwolf, but they don't see who's flying her and God knows, they can't catch her."

He regarded her doubtfully. "And Zeus?"

Marella shrugged. "It's our obligation to recover Airwolf, Hawke. You know that. We're always going to try, especially after we've been so badly embarrassed."

"Archangel made me a promise."

"And it almost cost him his life," she snapped, anger failing to hide the sudden sheen of moisture in her eyes. "It still might."

"You going to honor his promise?"

She looked away, and though he couldn't see her face, he could see her swallowing, regaining control.

"I already have," Marella answered, very quietly. "I already am."


	11. Chapter 11

Marella pushed open the door to the hospital room, exhaling softly but with real feeling as she stepped into the quiet of the room. Jude, sitting in the chair next to the hospital bed, looked up from a bound document and regarded Marella with a smile before her eyes flashed over to Briggs, whose chest rose and fell with the soft, slow breaths of deep sleep.

"Asleep?" Marella asked in a low voice, swallowing her disappointment.

"He's been mostly out of it all day," Jude confirmed, closing her document. The pale blue cover indicated it was one of the Firm's briefing folders.

Marella nodded as she walked toward the bed, studying Briggs and the monitors, mentally filing her impressions, both medical evaluation and personal assessment.

"The Haydens?"

"Went out for an early dinner about twenty minutes ago," Jude said. "And then I think they were going home."

"Why don't you take a break?" Marella suggested. "I can sit with him for a while."

No encouragement was needed; Jude was out of her chair in a flash with a ready smile.

"Thanks. I could really use a cup of coffee. Want one?"

Coffee sounded wonderful but what she really needed was Briggs awake and alert enough for conversation. He'd been extubated earlier in the day and would finally be able to respond and communicate, as much as his condition permitted.

"I'm fine. Go stretch your legs, get some air. I can stay for at least thirty minutes, maybe longer."

Not much longer, as much as she'd like to stay. There was simply too much going on; even with Laban officially in charge, her hands were more than full trying to keep the office running smoothly. The Airwolf team was waiting until cover of darkness to head south to La Presa, and she was still waiting for their prey to take the bait laid out so carefully.

Aware of Jude heading towards the door, Marella leaned over the bed and touched Briggs' shoulder.

"Sir?"

No response; his breathing was steady and deep.

Marella shot a quick look at the door and listened carefully to the click of Jude's high heels as the woman walked down the long hallway of the Firm's clinic. There were numerous benefits to bringing Briggs back to their clinic: the clinic's ICU was otherwise empty, allowing the Firm to station two armed guards at the entrance to ICU, and allowing the entire ICU staff to tend their critically ill Deputy Director.

The clinic's ICU rooms also had walls and real doors, which allowed quite a bit more privacy.

"Michael?"

Still no response. God, he really was out of it; normally he was a light sleeper, easy to wake. Frowning, Marella moved her hand from his shoulder to his face. Cupping the side of his face gently, she leaned over and kissed him hello on lips that were dry and chapped but still tasted like Michael. She allowed herself to linger for a moment, giving thanks for something that she had almost taken for granted.

"Honey, you really need a shave," she said, stroking the stubble on his jaw, taking note of the silver strands intermixed, a contrast to the solid golden blond of his mustache. The nasal cannula was a marked visual and psychological improvement over the ventilator tube; his features, slack with deep sleep, were at least visible, the bruises were fading to a sickly yellow and the abrasions had lost their red rawness.

One thumb raised his right eyelid, revealing the telltale pupil.

"Damn. They pumped you full of pain killers."

And with the luck she'd been having lately, it would take hours before the drugs wore off enough for him to be anywhere near coherent enough to discuss the situation. Frustrated and curious, Marella left his side and walked to the end of the bed, searching out his chart. She located it easily – the medical team at the clinic was remarkably consistent – and scanned it, eyebrows flying up as she studied the latest entries.

"That can't be right," she muttered, eyes shifting between Briggs and the chart. She read the chart again, and then more slowly, starting at the photocopied entries from the Trauma Center's ICU, five days earlier.

Lips pursued, she stood at the end of the bed, one foot tapping in a display of nerves she'd never indulge in public, weighing the risks of leaving Briggs alone against the curiosity consuming her, sorting through all the possible reasons for the sudden increase in dosage, none of them to her liking. It had been five days since the crash and with the exception of one unknown interloper in UCLA's ICU, there had been no other attempts on his life. Perhaps a 24-hour watch by his staff was no longer necessary, especially with a dedicated team of guards outside, but she was reluctant to leave him alone, not even to venture to the nurses' station to carefully elicit whatever she could about a dosage level she found both alarming and ill timed.

The scrawled signature and notation on the chart showed that the Chief of Staff, Phyllis Valen herself, had ordered a dosage that increased by almost fifty percent the morphine administered intravenously, but there was no indication why she'd done so. Briggs was undoubtedly in considerable pain -- femur and pelvic fractures were said to be agonizing -- but Marella knew him well enough to know with certainty that he hadn't requested an increase in pain medication.

The chart yielded nothing; no complications, no changes in status. The tests performed that day indicated a slight improvement: he was still hypotensive, though he was inching closer to being hemodynamically stable, which considering the amount of red blood cell packs, he'd received, was overdue in her opinion. Pancreatic tests were inconclusive. Serum creatinine and serum potassium levels were still too high, but not high enough to warrant dialysis. There was some reduction in swelling around the external fixator pins and no sign of infection.

"I don't like this."

The increase in dosage was odd, a little sudden, and definitely out of context, but it wasn't a risky dose. Briggs had tolerated similar levels of opioids after Red Star. At this dose, the painkiller would effectively act as a sedative, which might actually be the point.

"I need to talk to you," she said, frustrated at his imposed unconsciousness. "Your third tracer worked, but I really wish it hadn't. I think I know where Airwolf is and obviously, I have an obligation to the Firm to recover her, but the timing couldn't be worse. I think even Zeus may table his search for it." She strode over to Jude's chair and drew it up near to the bed, facing Briggs instead of the door and sitting with a profound exhale. "If we recover Airwolf now, it will appear that the operation against us forced us to do so. Laban will get credit for her recovery, not you or me. We'll take all of the blame and get none of the thanks. Frankly, I don't see how it benefits us to recover Airwolf under these circumstances, unless we come up with a truly devious solution." She waited for a minute and then sighed into the silence. "That was your cue, you know."

She picked up his right hand – they always sat on his right so that he would see them if he woke – and studied it, rubbing his callused thumb between her fingers like one might rub prayer beads. The square nails were neatly clipped, long fingers paler than normal though it had been less than a week since he'd last been in the sun. Fine blond hairs covered the back of his hand, its skin marred by a long gash stretching diagonally from the base of his forefinger to the outside of his wrist. They'd theorized that his hand had gone through the windshield, or perhaps he'd just raised his arm to protect his head. Either way, the nasty red abrasion was healing slowly.

"I need to talk to you," she repeated, slipping her fingers through his and taking comfort in the solid and familiar weight of his hand. "Well, to be honest, I really wanted to hear your voice. I do need to figure out the next step and it would be nice to figure it out with a little input."

The morphine left Briggs unnaturally still, not at all the restless sleeper he was at home, awake at the slightest sound, twisting in his sleep as if shaking off the demons of his job. She studied him with little objectivity and great affection, but even the fondest assessment would agree that he was in no condition for coming up with solutions, devious or otherwise.

"Apparently very little input," Marella said, with a sigh. She stretched out in the chair, slid down into a more comfortable position. Resting their clasped hands on the side of his bed, she closed her eyes. Briggs' quiet and steady breathing was a good focal point for a harried mind and she listened to it and tried to time her own breathing to match.

"Since you're not up to talking, I'll just close my eyes until Jude gets back."

It was a comfortable position -- someone had gone to the trouble of fetching an upholstered arm chair to replace the plastic hospital substitute -- and she drifted for a few minutes, listening for the sound of high heels or a door opening.

It wasn't a sound that jarred her from her doze, but pain, a sudden vise-like pressure on her hand. Blinking away her foggy thoughts, she instinctively tried to pull her hand away from the pain before her eyes saw, and slowly processed the thought, that Briggs was gripping her hand tightly.

"Michael?"

Pushing up from the chair with her left hand – she wouldn't let go of his hand now no matter how much it hurt – she caught her breath when she saw a glimpse of blue eye.

"Michael?"

His eye was only narrowly open, glassy and unfocused in a sea of tight lines, pale skin damp with sweat, breathing harsh and rapid.

"Honey?" she said, uncertainly.

She touched the side of his face. It was slick and cool and he winced slightly. His eyelid dropped and then slid back up, gaze shifting as if he was trying to focus, to concentrate.

"Oh God, you're in pain," she said, appalled it had taken her so long to understand. "But it's too soon, you're not due for another shot until…"

She glanced at her watch, blinked in disbelief and then quickly scanned the room for a clock. The monitor on the other side of his bed confirmed the time on her watch. Somehow, almost four hours had passed since she closed her eyes.

Where the hell was Jude?

She stood, puzzled and irresolute until she felt another tremor of pain through Briggs' death grip on her hand.

"Oh, Michael." She touched his face again, gently, trying to convey reassurance in her tone and her caress. "Hold on, honey. Let me get you some relief."

She fumbled for the buzzer that would call the nurse on duty, pressed it hard and held the button down. In the quiet of the empty unit, she could hear the sound echo down the hallway from the nurse's station.

The door opened immediately. Not the nurse. Jude.

"Is everything okay?"

Jude's panicked glance swept over the entire room, focused on the medical monitors, Briggs' face and then Marella's in a rapid appraisal of the situation.

"Wow. He's awake." She narrowed her focus on Marella. "Are you okay?"

"Where did you…?"

The door opened again and Jude stepped aside immediately to let the nurse enter.

"He's in pain," Marella said simply, stepping back.

Jude joined her, the two of them standing guard while the nurse, on the other side of the bed, examined her patient.

"I was waiting for you to get back," Marella said in an aside, attention focused primarily on the nurse examining Briggs.

"You needed the sleep," Jude said. "I was just outside. I checked on you a few times." She glanced down. "You're going to lose circulation if you're not careful."

Marella followed her gaze. Her right hand was white and she was starting to lose feeling in it but she didn't want to take away whatever comfort or release he derived from his grip.

The nurse looked up and Marella searched her memory for the woman's name.

"He should be fine," the nurse said, giving them a reassuring smile. "It's just time for his next dose. I was heading in here in about five minutes anyway."

"Why the increase in dosage?" Marella asked abruptly. "The chart shows that the morphine dosage is up fifty percent."

She saw Jude's glance at their twined hands, the tension in both, the loss of color, and she realized it seemed a silly question. He was obviously in a great deal of pain.

"I would think," she continued, in a calmer and more reasonable voice, "that it's possible to control his pain without sedating him completely."

The nurse – what _was_ her name? – shrugged as she inserted the tip of the needle into the small bottle of morphine in her hand.

"With the previous dosage, he was restless." She stopped talking, her attention on the tiny lines on the needle. Checking the dosage in the needle against the written instruction on the chart one more time, she nodded, satisfied. "Dr. Valen was concerned that too much movement would affect the alignment." She waved, the direction could have indicated either the femur or the pelvic fracture, possibly even both.

Marella watched, fascinated despite herself as the needle entered the I.V. line, the clear fluid joining the fluid from the I.V. bag. The tension began draining from Briggs' face and out of his grip on her hand with surprising suddenness. His eyelid fluttered before steadying in a narrowly open position as his breathing calmed.

The nurse smiled at her. "It's really for the best. You know how Archangel tends to push himself. The rest is healing."

Marella's eyebrow shot up, equally dubious of the rationale and the platitude.

"I'll have to ask you to step outside," the nurse said, attention now returned solely to her patient. "I need to check his incisions."

Marella wouldn't mind a peak at the incisions to see how they were healing; the rows of staples had been angry slashes, all too reminiscent of Frankenstein's monster, and she'd be damned if the nurse was going to toss her out now that Briggs was finally awake.

"I need to talk to him while he's awake," she insisted. "Once that dose kicks in fully, he'll fall back asleep."

The nurse frowned and scrutinized Marella as if to determine whether or not the other woman would back down. Apparently coming to the correct conclusion, she nodded. "I'll be back in five minutes, but then he needs his rest."

Waiting safely until the nurse had left the room, Jude grinned. "I guess she knows better than to argue with you."

"Give me a minute," Marella said, nodding towards the door. "I need to discuss something with Archangel."

She waited until Jude had left the room to turn her attention back to Briggs.

"I have women fighting over me," he marveled in a hoarse and barely audible voice.

"Don't even pretend that's anything other than what you expect," she answered, tightening her clasp of his hand and smiling so fiercely that it hurt.

"Are you okay?" He sounded both relieved and surprised to see her.

"I'm not the one in ICU, honey, you are."

"What happened? Someone said a crash…." He trailed off, concentrating on her face.

Marella caught her breath.

"I wasn't in the helicopter with you when it crashed," she said as calmly as she could. "Karen Allenden was flying you back from the research facility at Alameda when your helicopter was attacked. It was shot down."

She watched him assimilate the information and anticipated his next question

"Karen is still at UCLA Medical Center, where you were before. She's in ICU." Both her legs were mangled beyond recognition. They amputated one; her doctors were still trying to save the other. "There was no real reason to move her here and her husband didn't want to risk it unless the move was necessary." His doctors hadn't wanted to risk moving Briggs either; Zeus overruled them.

He exhaled shakily and closed his eye. "What am I on? It's knocking the hell out of me."

"Morphine," she said. "I'll talk to your doctor about the dose but it's normal for you to sleep a lot right now."

"How long?" he said, words riding on his exhaled breath.

"Since the crash? Almost five days."

He shook his head slightly, eye still closed. "How long am I going to be in here?"

Marella started to laugh, heard the laugh wobble wetly, veering into hysteria and forced herself to stop. It was enough to make Briggs open his eye and regard her with a troubled expression.

"I'm sorry," he said slowly, squeezing her hand and visibly struggling to focus. "The fact that my mother's here tells me I was in pretty bad shape and you were worried."

"I wasn't worried, I was _terrified_," she said, appalled at how unsteady her voice sounded. "And you're still in pretty bad shape, Michael. You can barely lift your head."

"Damn. You're still scared," he said softly. "Come here."

Marella wiped her eyes and glanced warily at the door. "That nurse is going to be back in a minute."

"I'll be asleep by then," he said, voice already starting to fade.

She leaned over, very carefully, and wrapped her arms around his neck. Cradling the base of his skull, she pulled his head up slightly and rested her cheek next to his. The pent up emotion leaked out of her mouth with a large sigh.

"Better," he murmured.

"Mmmhmmm," she answered, drinking in the tactile sensation of him breathing on his own. "Your third tracer worked; I think I know where Hawke hides Airwolf."

"That's good." His voice was just a breath in her ear.

"But the timing is bad for a number of reasons. I don't think now is the right time to recover her."

"Then don't."

He sighed and his breathing changed as he slid back into sleep. Marella pulled away regretfully. Holding his face in her hands, she leaned in to kiss him goodbye, whispering, "I love you," into his mouth.

The door opened behind her and she raised her head, resentful at the lack of privacy and annoyed with herself for losing track of time when she knew the nurse was returning.

"This is awkward, though not entirely unexpected," Zeus said. "Shall I come back later?"


	12. Chapter 12

"I don't know where she is. She was supposed to contact us at 1900 hours," Hawke said irritably into his helmet mike.

He glanced down at the topography below him, or what he could see in the fading light. The sunset to the West was a spectacular sight and its almost horizontal streams of deep gold light spotlighted every crevice and crack in the rocky terrain below. It was a beautiful end to the day and promised a gentle evening for hunting a helicopter posing as Airwolf and the crew who'd caused so much trouble.

"Where are we, Dom?"

"Just east of Escondido."

"Radar suppression," Hawke ordered, automatically.

"Still got a ways to Miramar," Santini countered, but complied anyway.

Hawke increased their speed. The plan was to hit La Presa just after sunset and they were running a little behind. Hawke would agree with those who said he was a hard man, but he'd have to be a lot more of a bastard if he'd begrudged Caitlin the time for a hot shower and a change of clothes after she'd babysat Airwolf for the last few days without complaint or hesitation.

Hawke turned to his copilot. "You okay?"

Caitlin grinned. "That shower did me a world of good. I'm definitely looking forward to sleeping in a real bed after we get done, but I'm not tired or anything."

"You did real good," Santini called. "String was right, you know. Marella said Zeus was looking for Airwolf."

Still looking in her direction, Hawke caught the quick blush, the chin tucked away to hide her pleasure.

"You did good," he said softly.

"You guys went to jail," she protested. "I know that wasn't any fun."

"We had flush toilets," Santini said with a laugh. "That beats digging a trench any day."

"Jail was easy," Hawke said simply. "I knew Airwolf was in safe hands."

The sunset's brightness had nothing on the happy glow bursting from the woman just to his left. She'd earned it and Hawke felt a powerful sense of satisfaction in giving the acknowledgement, at least as good as Caitlin felt in receiving it. Maybe he was getting soft in his old age.

One thing he was sure of: he was damn happy to be at Airwolf's controls, each minute adjustment of her controls hurrying her crew faster and further towards action. Hawke didn't understand the attraction of thoroughbred horse racing but after too many days of sitting on his ass, he sympathized with the racehorses that stomped and snorted as they were led to the starting gates. Sitting in that jail cell might have helped Marella in one part of her operation, but he damn well would have preferred getting in on the chase last Thursday or Friday. He'd been held back for days and days, each day winding him a little tighter and it was past time to let loose and kick some ass.

"You get a chance to tinker with her search programs, Dom?"

"Yeah, yeah, keep your pants on, would you," Santini replied, distracted and a little annoyed. "I'm doing some tweakin', running some scans and seeing what comes up. We still have a ways to go, you know."

Hawke's lips tilted upward just a little. "You getting anything?"

"Yeah, lots and lots of birds and she's telling me exactly what each one is. How about you fly us down there and let me get some work done?"

"Didn't know the Firm programmed the Peterson guides into their armored stealth aircraft," Caitlin said, with a giggle. "Maybe you can see if we get movies or something next."

Hawke could hear Santini grumbling, each click as his thick mechanic's fingers tapped the keys on Airwolf's user access, and the resulting muttered utterances, which were probably best not known. He turned his attention back to Caitlin.

"Find any other presents from Archangel while you were babysitting?" Hawke asked, pretending a casualness he didn't entirely feel. Marella was giving off very odd vibes, as if she was sending a subliminal message that something had changed. On the other hand, Zeus had been actively looking for Airwolf, and despite Marella's taunt days earlier that the Firm had a very good idea of Airwolf's location, Airwolf was still in Hawke's hands. Possible that she'd been posturing for the FBI, but there was something tickling away at the back of Hawke's mind.

"I think I checked every grain of sand, every mote of dust," Caitlin replied in theatrical tones. "Every wire, every electrical connection, every millimeter…"

"I get it," Hawke interrupted, with a grudging smile. "We found all of Michael's toys." He still had that prototype transceiver; had stuck in the pocket of his jeans and carried it around with him. Maybe he'd give it back to Briggs once this whole job was over.

"In the Lady and in the Lair, maybe," Santini said deliberately, attention drawn from Airwolf's programs. "You know, String, we never searched the hangar or the Jet Ranger. If Archangel was planning to drop some kind of tracking mechanism in Airwolf, he might have left something somewhere else too."

"He was blindfolded in the Jet Ranger, Dom," Hawke argued. "Both there and back. Kind of tough to place a transceiver if he couldn't see what he was doing."

He wished he believed the words he was saying. His heart rate had throttled up as soon as Santini mentioned the Jet Ranger. No point in Archangel bugging the hangar – they never discussed the Lair's actual location in any detail and they swept for bugs every other day at Briggs' insistence. Damn. Hawke had thought of searching the Jet Ranger, had planned to do so and had let it slip from the forefront of his mind when the Hungary mission came up.

"Damn," he said with quiet emphasis.

Santini and Caitlin held their tongues; the silence was not a comfortable one and Hawke's good mood sank along with the sun.

* * *

Marella followed Zeus into the hallway, a strangling sense of tension in her esophageous. Her heart in her throat? That was the appropriate term, but the description was all wrong. Her heart resided in the ICU room she'd just left, so it was obviously some other organ choking her breathing as her career teetered on the brink of self-destruction. Her stomach perhaps. It would certainly explain the hollow feeling in her abdominal area.

"Jude," Marella said quietly, inclining her head towards the door to Briggs' room, relieved that the young woman obeyed without question. She caught the nervous sidelong glance Jude shot at Zeus as the woman strode rapidly back into the hospital room and resumed her assigned watch.

Zeus was flexing the fingers of both hands, stretching each finger individually, bending each fingertip sequentially towards his palm, as a pianist might exercise his fingers, stretching the tension out of the joints without cracking them. That the Firm's Director suffered from arthritis was one of the worst kept secrets in the office, unspoken and never gossiped about because of the equally never-discussed knowledge that the man's hands had been broken years ago on a field assignment that had gone terribly wrong. A master politician and manipulator he might be, but he'd earned his position one brutal success at a time.

"I can't have it, you know," Zeus said, words aimed at Marella though he addressed the windows.

The hallway of the clinic's ICU held a wall of windows that its individual rooms lacked and Marella was unnerved to see that the evening was upon them already. She'd made commitments to Hawke and had planned to be in La Presa by now. It would be a major misstep to glance at her watch -- Zeus might be looking at the windows but he'd know and any sign of disrespect would only make the situation more strained – but the almost blue light outside, the gloaming her grandmère had called it, told her she was already late.

"Not in a direct reporting line," Zeus continued, as if he hadn't paused in between statements. "I have spoken to Archangel in the past about my concerns that he was too close to you. I thought the situation had resolved itself when you took your internship at Walter Reed."

Zeus had obviously misread the situation if he had been relieved when she left, after completing her medical degree, to do her one-year internship working on the bio-chemical side of intelligence. She and Briggs had never acknowledged their mutual attraction until she was no longer reporting directly to him. Odd that Zeus, an unusually perceptive man renowned for his insight into human motivations, had failed to see that it was the separation that made the relationship possible, perhaps inevitable. Or maybe he had, but hadn't anticipated that Briggs would find a reason to bring Marella back to Knightsbridge.

"No defense? No claim of sexual harassment or a quid pro quo arrangement?" Zeus asked, turning to pin her under his unblinking stare. "You admit to willingly participating in an affair with your direct superior officer?"

Marella swallowed, felt her spine stiffen as she tried to not display any sign of apprehension. "No defense, sir. Although I would not categorize it as simply an affair."

That intrigued him, she saw instantly. The slight tilt of his head, the barely perceptible parting of his lips in surprise as he studied her. "I see." The timbre of his voice, the weight of his assessment indicated that he was reevaluating the situation in light of new evidence, though not necessarily in her favor.

"You are aware of the significance of the policies that the two of you have violated?" The question was matter-of-fact. Neither of them were naïve nor foolish enough to not comprehend potential ramifications of their behavior and Zeus was keenly aware of that fact. "As the senior officer, Archangel will bear the brunt of the responsibility, though obviously," pale blue-gray eyes darted to the closed door of the hospital room, "any formal repercussions will be delayed pending his recovery and return to duty."

Marella moistened her lips, roping in emotions, especially any urges to defend Briggs. Any argument or defense, impassioned or otherwise, would not serve either of them well with Zeus right now.

Zeus rubbed the inside corner of his left eye, frowning as he did so. "There will be consequences, but for the immediate future, you will continue to report to Laban and retain your title as Senior Intelligence Officer, until I direct otherwise."

She continued to breath normally; releasing a held breath in relief gave far too much away to a man who would make use of the information.

"I did come here for a purpose," Zeus said gruffly, a signal Marella read as meaning the formal dressing-down had concluded, at least for now. "Your gambit at Andrews yielded results, as did the waterfall surveillance approach. An expensive technique but worth the investment in this particular instance."

Finally, Marella thought, allowing her brows to rise to indicate interest, though not surprise. Zeus' features arranged and rearranged on his face as he decided upon the reaction he wanted to portray. In reading each expression as they quickly flashed, Marella saw embarrassment, anger, disappointment, betrayal, and calculation. She knew better than to imagine she saw anything but what Zeus wanted her to see and the variety and depth of his emotions indicated that the results they'd obtained had not been what was expected, had possibly been more effective than what was expected.

"Sir," she said neutrally, hoping desperately that it wasn't anyone in Archangel's division, someone that they'd let penetrate their organization.

"No one in DO," Zeus said sharply, clearly anticipating her first reaction, 'nor DI. Far worse than that, I'm afraid."

He'd excluded seventy percent of the organization in one sweeping statement, but for it to be worse than someone in Operations or Intelligence, it would have to be…. Marella swallowed hard, suddenly dismayed as she realized what Zeus had implied.

He nodded in grim acknowledgement. "Eleanor Artois was taken into custody approximately two hours ago. Debriefing is underway."

Marella didn't bother trying to hide her shock, felt her mouth fall open, eyes widen.

"Thor is personally leading the team backtracking anything and everything she might have conveyed to her handler. It will primarily be an analytical operation, but we'll be crosschecking with agents and case officers. You'll act as point person in DO and will liaison with Dr. Harris during debriefing if pharmacological support is required."

Emotions were swirling and arriving in waves. Shock, dismay, disgust, betrayal, horror at the notion that a woman she had liked, someone who had been kind and supportive to her, someone she had actually trusted, was the person feeding information to their enemy. And then surprised elation at the realization that Zeus was offering her a plum assignment, a gesture surprising in light of the potential demotion or suspension she'd expected, might still face.

"Yes, sir. Thank you," she managed to get out.

Zeus watched her steadily for a few moments. "Don't make me regret it."

"No sir," she said quietly, trying to convey in tone and expression that she understood the confidence implicit in the assignment.

Confidence that would be far more difficult than normal for Zeus to offer in light of her exposed affair with Archangel, and particularly difficult in light of the unexpected betrayal of the Committee's secretary, someone who compiled the briefing packets and produced minutes of every Committee meting. Someone, if Marella had heard correctly, who was not only a long-time associate of Zeus' but someone with whom he'd reportedly once been very close.

"I will inform Archangel when his condition permits," Zeus said. "Obviously, this information is need-to-know, and I'll determine who needs to know and when." Eyebrows arched, querying confirmation.

"I understand, sir."

Footsteps, even softened by rubber soles, drifted down the corridor towards them and Zeus' gaze shifted over Marella's shoulders. The returning nurse, Marella surmised, turning to see that she was correct. They watched in silence as the nurse entered Briggs' room and as Jude exited shortly afterwards. The silence held, heavy and uncomfortable, until Jude made her way to the nurse's station.

"What is Archangel's current condition?"

Marella shifted, standing too long in one position in heels inevitably led to sore feet. "He was extubated earlier this afternoon," she said. "His condition is still critical, but is now stable. He was conscious, alert and communicative earlier for a short period of time; the duration of his alert periods are primarily a factor of the high dosages of painkillers currently prescribed."

Zeus frowned, crossing his arms and shifting his own position as he considered the status report. "In your opinion, how long until he is able to return to duty?" A hiss of breath escaped clenched teeth as he reflected on his question. "Assuming he will eventually return to duty."

Marella hesitated, instincts protective of Briggs at war with her judgment as an Intelligence Officer. "In my opinion?" she hedged. "Assuming there are no complications from his injuries, four to six months before he is medically fit enough to return to work."

There was a flicker of amusement in Zeus' eyes, squashed fairly quickly but not before Marella noticed it.

"And how long before Archangel considers himself well enough to return to work?"

Marella sighed, acknowledging the astuteness of Zeus' question. "Three months maximum. Possibly as little as four to six weeks if he sets up office here."

"All right," Zeus said with a steely resolve. "Assuming that the two of you plan to continue what you say is more than a simple affair, you have approximately six weeks to present me with a recommended solution, one in which you no longer report directly to Archangel, and which will be in place before he returns to duty. Do I make myself clear?"

Stunned, her breath caught in her throat before she stammered, "Yes, sir."

"By no means should you construe that I condone your behavior, either of you, nor that this is the extent of the consequences for that behavior. You should expect, at the very minimum, a formal reprimand."

"Yes, sir."

"And I will address the situation with Archangel when his condition permits."

Marella hid a wince; that would be ugly. "Yes, sir."

It was far more generous than she could have hoped, though she still had no idea what the consequence might be, for herself or for Briggs.

"Your operation identified the spy in our organization," Zeus said, his expression icing over for a moment. "Track down the bogus Airwolf so we can wrap this entire mess."

His tone of voice conveyed that she was dismissed and Marella took advantage of the opportunity. She was late, but at least she could call Laura in La Presa and get patched though to Airwolf before darkness set in.

"Yes, sir. Thank you, sir."

* * *

They skimmed over the canopy of treetops, close enough for Hawke to identify the varied vegetation below. In the last light of evening, he picked out sycamore, willow and cottonwood trees in the canopy. Even in daylight, it would be impossible to see what was in the understory from the altitude he'd maintained. Rocky outcroppings jutted up through the canopy, the jagged rock softened only slightly by chaparral and coastal sage scrub. Approaching from the eastern most sector of the target area, Airwolf hugged the foothills and valleys of the Jamul Mountain range, dipping downward to investigate the creeks and tributaries that crisscrossed the broad flat valleys and rolling hills.

"There are a few natural caves in this range, Hawke, though I don't know how we'd find them in the dark," Caitlin said. She folded the topographical maps she'd been studying and tucked them back into the map case next to her seat.

"That's my job, Red," Santini called confidently from the back. "I'm running scans. Infrared to find life forms or heat sources that might be a vehicle or helicopter. And the Lady's computers are scanning any ground or air vehicles against her database."

"How low we need to be?" Hawke said, eyes trained on the ever-changing landscape. The flat grassy areas generally transitioned into the steep slopes of sage scrub and chaparral, giving him plenty of time to adjust but every so often, Airwolf's collision warning system picked up looming forms of metavolcanic rock in their path before he saw them. Even exceptional eyesight strained in the twilight hour and it was still too light for night vision lenses.

"This is good," Santini said. "We're low enough that I'm picking up some wildlife, mostly bats and rats so far."

Caitlin shuddered and Hawke hid a grin. "Let me know when you find some human sized rats, eh, Dom?" He nodded to Caitlin. "Time to go to work."

She triggered the radio for automatic transmit and receive. "La Presa Control, come in. This is your Birds Eye View, come in. I repeat, La Presa Control, this is your Birds Eye View, come in."

"Stupid name," Santini muttered from the back and Hawke couldn't argue since he agreed. But Marella hadn't wanted them announcing that the real Airwolf was hunting in Southern California when her operation implied Airwolf was sitting in a locked hangar at Andrews AFB.

"Birds Eye View, this is La Presa Control," Laura's coolly collected voice came back at them. "What's your location?"

Caitlin angled the photocopied and marked-up topographical map that Marella had given Hawke earlier. "La Presa, we're set to run a grid search, beginning in the southeast corner of the target area, Sycamore Canyon,32 degrees 39 north, 116 degrees, 48 west, working west to Upper Otay Lake, west northwest to Wild Man's Canyon and then northeast to Steele Canyon Bridge. Confirm."

The search team, the Firm, the FBI and the Sheriff's department had maintained spotters in those four compass points since the previous Thursday night, roadblocks surrounding the target area, and had gently turned away hikers and any other non-resident who sought entrance under the guise that a mountain lion had been sighted just off Proctor Valley Road.

"Birds Eye View, your parameters are confirmed and you have a go to begin your grid search. Your mission is find and inform, do not engage. Please confirm mission understanding and acceptance."

Caitlin clicked the automatic transmit off, muting the radio for a moment, and glanced at Hawke, a small smile playing around the corners of her mouth.

"She's got our number," Santini said, laughing softly.

"We gonna play by the rules?" Caitlin asked Hawke.

"Well, we'll definitely find 'em."

She grinned and flipped the radio switch. "La Presa Control, Birds Eyes View will find your bogeys and we'll let you know where they are," Caitlin said cheerfully into the radio handset. "Birds Eye View out."

Santini laughed again. "Awww, they knew what they were in for when they asked us to do the job."

Hawke nosed Airwolf around to the west and started her in a low crawl over the first grid, letting Dominic practice scanning over the flat grassy areas first. He kept his focus on flying, Caitlin was scanning the ground below and around them for anything that seemed worth checking out and Dominic was tapping away at the keyboard. It stayed mostly flat, grass and trees, until they reached Cedar Canyon.

"This is a developed area, Dom," Caitlin warned. "Expect to read some people."

"Feds check it out?" he answered, voice somewhat distracted. "Got a few, not as many as I thought."

"Bats and rats," Hawke muttered with a chuckle.

"And mice and snakes and toads and lizards, and lots more mice and lizards," Santini shot back at him. "You want a running commentary, I'll give you one."

"I'll pass, thanks."

"Just a couple of human-sized heat sources, thank you very much. I'll be sure to let you know if I find that mountain lion that's supposedly roaming the area."

More trees and grass, and mice according to Airwolf's sensors. The foothills were just to the North and Hawke could feel how the wind changed when he drifted too close in that direction. Dipping into the canyons to run scans was going to be fun. A bit dicey but definitely not boring.

He brought Airwolf back around to begin grid number two, worked her over the terrain towards Hollenbeck Canyon, eyes sweeping ahead, a constant scan with his vision and his sense. There was nothing out there, he knew it. This wasn't the territory he'd pick to go to ground, but the whole point of a grid search was the discipline, not the instinctive hunting technique he'd prefer.

"Looks like the highest altitude in this area is about 2500 feet," Caitlin said.

"San Miguel Mountain," Hawke said. "Elevation 2,565 feet. Backdrop to all the tourist pictures of San Diego. Probably not the best place to hide a helicopter."

"San Miguel, eh?" Santini piped up from the back. "It would be kind of appropriate, don't ya think?"

"Don't think Michael would agree with you, Dom. Anyway, I think those ridges south of Proctor Valley Rd, a little northwest of us, look good. That's where I'd stash something I didn't want anyone to find."

And why they'd started the grid search in the southeast corner instead of La Presa.

"Birds Eye View, this is La Presa Control, come in."

"Go ahead, La Presa."

"Birds Eye View, I am patching through a transmission from Angel Two."

Caitlin winced noticeably, Hawke less obviously, and he heard Santini in the back mutter a quick "Please, Lord, keep that one in the air."

"Go ahead, La Presa," Caitlin said, somewhat uncertainly.

A quick burst of feedback, static, and then the dull roar of rotor blades. Copter to copter transmissions always carried a bit of background noise pollution.

"Birds Eye View, this is Angel Two," Marella's voice called loudly. "This is Angel Two, come in Birds Eye View."

Hawke put out his palm. Caitlin shrugged and deferred.

"Angel Two, you're a little late to the party," he replied. "We were forced to start without you. You have a change of plans?"

"Sorry for the delay, Birds Eye View." Amusement filtered across the radio transmission in the warm good humor of Marella's voice. "I had an unexpected meeting with the Director. Seems our East Coast operation wrapped up earlier this afternoon."

About damn time, Hawke thought. It didn't mean they could bandy about Airwolf's call sign on open radio transmission but at least the FBI might not freak if or when Airwolf identified their prey.

"That's one down," Hawke growled. "Angel Two, request permission to suspend grid search. Doesn't take our capabilities to do a grid search over grassland."

"Negative, Bird's Eye View," Marella said emphatically.

"Come on, Marella, any Firm helicopter could sweep the flat land or wider valleys. Even the Feds could do it," he added, mostly for his own amusement. "I've a notion where they might have stashed our missing bird."

"Birds Eye." She packed a powerful amount of pure exasperation into those two little words. "Is it really too much to expect a coordinated search effort? We've had people on foot and in the air since last week…"

"And you've found nothing," Hawke interrupted. "I think I might know a little more about hiding a helicopter than the people you've had searching this place."

Marella laughed outright. "You're not on scrambler, Birds Eye View," she reminded him, warning implicit.

"You let me do it my way, and if I don't find your bird, I'll go back to doing a grid search," Hawke offered.

There was radio silence; obviously Marella was thinking about it.

"Do I actually have a choice?" she finally asked.

Hawke felt a grin spreading outward, a small grin, but a grin nonetheless. "Not really, Angel Two. Glad you see things my way."

* * *

Author's Notes – Chapter 12:

**Walter Reed **is an Army Medical Center, which includes the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research (WRAIR), the largest and most diverse biomedical research laboratory in the Department of Defense.

**Waterfall surveillance:** A surveillance team walks directly at the target rather than following from behind. A good waterfall surveillance requires many people and cars and is therefore expensive. As soon as a surveillant passes his target, he turns down the first cross street, walks to a parallel street, and catches a van that drives him ahead of the target so he can rejoin the flow, often wearing a change of clothes.

**DO ** Directorate/Department of Operations

**DI ** Directorate/Deparment of Intelligence


	13. Chapter 13

A/N: I've been trying to post this for the last 24 hours. FFN finally let me post it in text format.

* * *

"Hey, String, I have a heat source, five degrees north-northwest. I think we need to check this out."

They were following an unmarked trail, a hiker's trail, through the ridges and foothills southwest of San Miguel Mountain. Some of the ridges were sharp edged, dipping down two or three hundred feet into crevices narrow enough that no helicopter could follow. Hovering over them, Santini ran scans for any signs of life, any signs of heat.

Adjusting Airwolf's direction to head five degrees north-northwest, Hawke frowned as he realized that Santini had sounded odd.

"What's it look like?"

"That's the thing," Santini confessed. "It's reading stronger than any of the wildlife I've found. It's hot."

"Camp fire again?" Caitlin said speculatively. "That'll be three in the last two hours."

"So much for no hikers in the area," Hawke said. "If the hikers are getting through, our guys could walk out easy."

They'd radioed each of the previous two contacts to La Presa Control with coordinates and Laura had dispatched a field team to check out the people on the ground. If it gave La Presa Control the impression that the Airwolf team was following directions not to engage, well, Hawke couldn't help it if they believed what they wanted to believe. He smirked a little remembering Caitlin's reaction when he'd turned Airwolf's spotlight on the last pair of hikers, caught _in__ flagrante delicto_. Her startled gasp and embarrassed head turn was probably a lot milder than the words pouring from the man whose naked ass had been in the air moments prior.

Airwolf climbed, maintaining at least a fifty-foot clearance over the top of the trees, climbing upward as they approached a higher than normal peak for the area.

"You still reading that hot spot, Dom?"

"Straight ahead," Santini replied confidently. "You should have a visual any minute now."

2100 feet above sea level, hovering over the 2000-foot peak and scanning ahead, Hawke still had to squint through night vision lenses to pick up a hint of red. To their left, the ground fell away rapidly, the treetop canopy impenetrable but directly ahead, the rocky slope declined more gradually, trees giving way to rocky ground, opening enough to have landed a helicopter the size of Airwolf.

"Got it."

He nudged the cyclic and Airwolf moved steadily in the direction of that small hint of red, which grew gradually larger as Airwolf ate up the ground beneath them. A few hundred yards from it, Hawke's eyes began to make sense of the image, the fire contained in some type of structure, the dark red hues of a fire that had almost burned itself out, consuming that which contained it. Consuming that which they sought.

"Oh, hell and damnation," Caitlin said, in a surprising bit of foul humor as she recognized the frame of the fire.

Grim, mouth set in a tight line, Hawke agreed. "You see any life signs in the area?"

"Not a thing. 'Course with this conflagration lighting up the infrared scans, there could be 50 people standing around and I don't think I could read 'em," Santini admitted.

The fire was primarily confined to the cabin, but the tail boom of the burning helicopter had broken and tipped down to the ground just aft of the cabin, and the fire, licking across the exterior paint, had spread around to some of the chaparral and other scrub. Hawke hovered over the area, looking around for a space far enough from the fire and the burning scrub and level enough to safely land Airwolf.

"Fuel tank didn't blow," he mused as he lowered the landing gear and gently descended a good distance east of the fire. "The structure seems intact. No debris field." He shut down the engines and studied the terrain around him as he waited for the rotors to slow their frenzied sweeps.

"Probably used the fuel to start the fire," Caitlin speculated. "Call La Presa?"

"Nope. I want to take a look around first."

"That wise?" Santini said, leaning forward. "These guys ain't friendly, you know."

Hawke undid his harness, noting peripherally that Caitlin immediately did the same. Before he got a word out, she was reaching under her seat and withdrawing a handgun, popping out the clip and checking to ensure it was fully loaded. Satisfied, she shoved the clip back in, set the safety on the automatic and tucked it into her belt. A raised eyebrow warned Hawke not to even think about telling her to stay behind.

"Dom, you mind keeping on eye on things here?"

"Trap?"

"Doubt it. I'm guessing someone told this team to pull out, that the real Airwolf was at Andrews. They're probably in another state by now."

Hoping he was wrong, Hawke eased the starboard hatch open and dropped to the rocky ground, weapon sweeping the area in front and to the right. He heard nothing. The fire had probably scared away any wildlife in the area, not that all that much was nocturnal anyway besides the bats and rats. He heard the thump of Caitlin's boots on the ground, knew she'd perform the same sweep and gave her a moment before he moved to the nose of their aircraft.

A quick nod to confirm that he'd go high, Caitlin low, and she moved to Hawke's left in a crouch. Halfway between Airwolf and her flaming twin, the first wave of heat hit him, along with the smell of smoldering wire, plastic and other manmade items. The stench probably kept away the wildlife as much as the fire. It was foreign, an unnatural smell in the midst of uninhabited forested hills.

"Oh, God"

Caitlin's low moan reached him at the same time as the change in smell. What was once a smell happily associated with barbeques and pig roasts was now and forever powerfully associated with Vietnam. Creeping closer to the burning wreckage, two-fisted grip on his gun still sweeping constantly left to right, right to left, Hawke could make out the charred figure slumped in the pilot's seat.

Not a crash, his mind supplied, shifting to data gathering mode even as his senses were assaulted and his emotions jarred. The helicopter had collapsed onto its landing gear, the rubber of its wheels melted into the rock, but other than the broken tail boom, it was intact. No debris meant no explosion. It had been burning a while; the flames devouring its interior barely licked the roof of the copter anymore, dull red heat eating away at the layers and layers of circuit cards and wiring running under the floorboards. Fire had consumed the paint, scorching the metal framework of the fuselage and wings. The fire had once been very hot, the flames had been high; that the ends of the main rotors were drooping was evidence of heat enough to stress the steel.

One body, not three. Marella had said they were looking for at least three men, Ray Zinn and two others. Two bogeys still out there.

Hawke circled the nose of the burning remains of Airwolf's 'twin' as Caitlin carefully picked her way around its tail and the burning scrub. He should have taken the tail, he realized irritated with himself, but she met him on the far side without incident.

"They must have unloaded the ammo," Hawke said, studying the port wing. He could make out the barrel of the gun, a 40 mm cannon; could be the same as Airwolf's or different. The wings were too hot for him to approach near enough to see. He glanced down, looking for the ADF pod that Marella had said wasn't there, but with the wheels melted away, the helicopter was resting on her belly.

"How long?" Caitlin said, eyes still scanning the unexplored area beyond the aircraft, but tilting her head back to the flames.

"I don't usually stick around afterwards to watch them burn." Hawke shrugged. "Can't be that long, especially if they used the fuel as an accelerant, right? An hour?"

Eyes still searching the dark, Caitlin sighed thoughtfully. "Think they're still here? The only ways out are another helicopter, dirt bike, horses or hiking."

"One way to find out," Hawke agreed. He gestured and they split again, Caitlin to the left, Hawke to the right.

It took some time to get far enough away from the burning wreckage to begin to reestablish his night vision. There were no caves in the area, no shelters, nothing with which to take cover or hide. After a period of about another hundred yards or so, the trees regained control of the hilltop. Hawke worked his way forward to the tree line, squinted into the thin forest, eyes and ears straining. All he could hear was the hiss of the fire and Caitlin's footfalls as she approached.

"Horses?" he said, with a raised eyebrow as he turned to face her. Trying not to laugh, his eyes searched the ground around them. It was mostly rock, but there was enough dirt to reveal a lack of hoof prints.

Caitlin shrugged, unapologetic and unembarrassed. "Horses make less noise than dirt bikes or a copter, and they're faster than hiking."

Uh huh. Cowgirl, he thought, stowing his gun and striding back in the direction of Airwolf.

"If they hiked out, the nearest road is north of here and there's a trail heading towards it," Caitlin said, a little out of breath as she tried to match Hawke stride for stride with shorter legs. "There's a better trail back from where we came, but it'd take a lot longer to get out of these hills to somewhere where they might have a car or something stashed."

As they dodged around the nose of the burning Bell, Hawke spared a thought for the poor bastard whose body was blackened beyond recognition, hoping the man, or woman, had been dead before the helicopter was set on fire. It was horrible way to die. His mood darkened as he remembered that might have been Archangel's fate, and his sympathy evaporated.

He pulled the Airwolf's hatch open, bad temper now driving an adrenaline spike, eager to find the men who'd shot down Angel One and had burned the evidence linking them to the crime.

"Nothing?" Santini called from the back.

Hawke ground his teeth in frustration and started Airwolf's engines.

"One body in the copter," Caitlin said softly. "No sign of anyone else."

"It didn't crash or explode," Santini said with surprise.

"Nope," Caitlin said, the shortness of her reply answer enough.

"Oh."

Airwolf rose in the air, the sweep of her rotors pushing wind towards her burning twin and fanning the flames for a few brief seconds before Airwolf ascended high enough that the flames died down.

"You said north?"

Caitlin studied the map, checked their coordinates and shook her head. "Sorry. It's more west-northwest." She leaned over to show him the map. "They'd have to follow along here, drop down a little and then climb back up here to reach the trail."

Hawke bit his lip, stared at the map until he understood the relative landmarks and directions. "That's more than an hour's hike," he decided. "Even Special Forces types would need at minimum of two hours, probably more depending on the terrain, to get to that road." He smiled without warmth. "Good."

Pushing the cyclic forward, Hawke snapped his night visor into place and triggered the radio.

"La Presa Control, this is…" Hawke sighed and shot a glance at Caitlin.

"La Presa, this is your Birds Eye View," Caitlin immediately supplied with a wry grin. "Come in, La Presa."

"Go ahead, Birds Eye View," Marella's voice answered.

"La Presa, we found your missing bird, or what's left of it anyway," Hawke said. "Someone torched it. Not _us_," he emphasized. "One bogey dead, in the copter. We're looking for the remaining two bogeys; we think they're on foot."

"Birds Eye View, please provide coordinates."

Caitlin read the coordinates and then confirmed them when Marella read them back to her.

"La Presa, you need to block off the nearest road…"

"Proctor Valley," Caitlin said.

"…and get some of your people in the area. We don't know how long that bird's been burning and how much of a head start the other guys have."

"Roger that, Birds Eye View," Marella replied, her voice grim. "Do we need Forestry Fire Department support to contain the blaze?"

Hawke looked at Caitlin, who just raised her shoulders. He wasn't sure either.

"Probably not, La Presa, if you get someone there with enough extinguishers fast enough. It's spread to some scrub but not much further. It's your call," he said, knowing she'd err on the side of caution.

"We have assistance en route, both for the fire and to contain anyone walking out. Nice job, Birds Eye View," she said, voice warming. "Keep us posted if you find our hikers. La Presa out."

She wasn't much for chitchat, something Hawke had always admired about Marella.

"Dom, we far enough from the fire to start infrared again?"

Rapid finger tapping on the keyboard was answer enough, even before Santini sighed. "Yeah, String. Light and heat pollution is dying down. I'll let you know if I see anything."

Hawke put Airwolf in a crawl, letting her drift a hundred yards right of center and then a hundred yards left of center in a slalom approach, allowing Santini to scan as much ground cover as possible, as they headed towards the trail. He kept a sharp eye on the altimeter as the ground dropped away below him and then surged up again, shifting the collective to hug the terrain, but not too closely. They hovered over a small valley, a sea of green leaves blocking penetration by the spotlight.

"That's about a hundred feet up at a forty-five degree angle," Caitlin estimated. "It might have been easier if they swung around to the right." She turned and looked at him. "Of course, they'd only have known that if they'd been planning this 'cause they couldn't see the different routes in the dark."

Hawke agreed, with both sentiments. The type of men who burned someone in a helicopter to cover their tracks had probably planned their escape route. He tapped the cyclic and swung back around to trace a route up on the right.

"Still nothing," Santini said, a heavy exhalation expressing everyone's frustration.

The top of the ridgeline leading towards the trail was less heavily forested, more scrub and rocks. Caitlin swept the spotlight back and forth and Hawke brought Airwolf down as low as he dared. The winds against the side of the hill buffeted him and he felt one gust swing Airwolf a little too hard to the left. Rotors slipped and they dropped a little. Swearing under his breath, Hawke swung them farther to the left, away from the hillside to where Airwolf's rotors could grab hold of the air and pull it under her blades. She bounced once and then settled, leveling off. Letting loose a tightly held breath, Hawke swung her around to the south and approached the ridgeline again, this time maintaining a higher altitude.

"I hate cliffs," Santini muttered in the back.

Hawke caught sight of the trail just after they passed over the v-neck of the ridge; as it opened up, he slowly descended until he maintained an altitude of fifty feet above the terrain. Hovering over the distinctive line of dirt, he sighed heavily, looking with exasperation upon a wide dirt track, a dirt road, rather than a hiking trail.

"Darn it!" Caitlin sounded close to tears with frustration. "The maps show it as a hiking trail, gosh darn it!"

"Hell and damnation," Hawke muttered, dipping Airwolf's nose and increasing her speed as he followed fresh tread marks in the dirt, heading west-northwest towards the major road.

"That's not funny, Hawke," Caitlin snapped.

He hadn't meant to make fun of her, the words just seemed appropriate and he'd borrowed them but he'd be damned if he'd apologize for doing so. He thumbed the radio.

"La Presa, this is the stupid name you stuck us with."

"Birds Eye View, this is La Presa," Laura answered calmly. "Go ahead."

Hawke scowled. Marella would have laughed at least.

"La Presa, that hiking trail… well, what the map showed as a hiking trail anyway," a quick conciliatory glance in Caitlin's direction but she wasn't looking at him, "isn't. It's a dirt road and it has fresh tire tracks. I don't know how old they are but it's a car or jeep or truck or something. Not dirt bikes. We'll continue pursuing but I think your bogeys are in a vehicle. Hope your roadblocks are ready."

There was a pause before Laura replied. Hawke would have used it to express his anger.

"Roger that, Birds Eye View," she replied, sounding for the first time a little tired and maybe tense. "Roadblocks are in place and have been reinforced a mile each way of where that track hits the road and there are Federal Agents searching in both directions."

"La Presa," Caitlin interrupted, topography map spread across her lap, "they get to that road and there are dozens of dirt tracks and roads on the other side, leading up and around San Miguel Mountain."

"We're aware of that, Birds Eye View," Laura said, definitely sounding a little worn. "The Sheriff assures us that all of those roads are local; no one can exit the area without coming out on one of the major roads, all of which we have road blocked."

Hawke felt Caitlin's eyes on him and he tilted his head to prompt her to speak.

"If that other trail, the one behind us, is also a road…"

He nodded. Those tire tracks below them looked fresh, but in dry country they could have been a few hours or a day or two old. "Where's it dump out?"

Caitlin's eyes widened as she checked. "Residential neighborhood."

Hawke had Airwolf swinging around to the southeast as the words finished coming out of her mouth.

"La Presa, we're going to check out the other hiking trail that might be a dirt road. We'll let you know what we find."

"Birds Eye, can you provide location of that other trail? The Sheriff here would like to make sure he has people on the other end of it."

"Not a lot of details on this map," Caitlin answered. "It looks like it ends at a residential area, due east of the place where we found the helicopter."

Laura sighed. "Got it, Birds Eye. The Sheriff knows which residential area you mean. Let us know if you find anything."

"Roger that," Caitlin replied. "Birds Eye Out."

They swung back over the location of the burning helicopter, noting that the fire didn't seem to have spread, nor was it out. Nor were any of Marella's people at the scene yet, though it was probably expecting too much to think they'd made it there already from La Presa, even in helicopters.

"There're two," Caitlin announced, starting to sound as tired and frustrated as Laura had just a moment earlier. "There's a small track, real close, and due east of where we found that helicopter, but I'm not sure it's big enough for a vehicle. The other one is south of their camp, but it's definitely much more probably a road."

Hawke smiled. "Definitely much more probably?" he said, gentling his voice so she'd know he wasn't making fun of her. Well, only a little, and kind of affectionately.

She blew a breath out, tired but not defeated nor defensive. "Yup. Definitely much more probably."

"They meet up anywhere? Run side-by-side?" he asked hopefully.

"Nope," Caitlin answered, with a headshake. "If you want my opinion, I think they're trying to hide, they go for the smaller one."

"Good enough for me," Hawke answered, and tapped the cyclic to the left.

Thirty minutes later, they weren't feeling as optimistic. Santini had run scans constantly, at different altitudes, with wide sweeps off what was definitely a very small track that just barely supported a vehicle. It too had tire tracks, somewhat faded, but still distinct, and the track disappeared occasionally under tree cover, often as it dipped or turned so that the Airwolf crew lost track of the road and spent valuable minutes trying to find it again. Finally, they traced it to the end with neither hide nor hair of their prey, but to the reassuring flashing lights of a Sheriff's patrol car.

"What's the phrase again?" Hawke said irritably as he turned Airwolf around.

"Hell and damnation," Caitlin answered. "We gonna track that other trail back from here towards their camp?"

He nodded.

It took them a while to find the trail. As Caitlin had said it was definitely much more probably a road. Wide enough even for two vehicles at the same time, though most certainly only a dirt track. An empty dirt track, with evidence of more than one set of tire tracks, each set of treads running over the others and impossible to see which way they were going. Caitlin kept a one eye on their coordinates; the other scanned the ground below.

"Nothing," Santini announced as they reached trail point that aligned with the camp.

Disheartened, disgruntled, and discouraged, Hawke allowed himself to look at the clock, something he'd been denying himself for what seemed like hours. 0300. Damn, he was tired. He tapped the cyclic to the right, and Airwolf rolled in that direction, heading back up to the camp. Silence reigned in the cabin, Airwolf's crew too tired to speak.

The fire was out, but the camp was brightly lit, with Federal Agents crawling all over the crime scene. Hawke made out a white Bell, which had landed in much the same spot he'd landed Airwolf earlier. He dipped Airwolf's nose in salute, circled the camp and waited, keeping a good 200 feet over the crowd below.

"Birds Eye View, this is Angel… Angel Two, come in, Birds Eye View."

Marella sounded as exhausted as Hawke felt.

"Angel Two, this is Birds Eye View," Hawke answered. "We're SOL on those other two bogeys. We've run down all three possible trails back to trail head and there are no warm bodies on them. They either went off-road or they're camping nowhere near those trails."

Or they made it out, they slipped the net and they're somewhere in another state, he thought, but didn't say aloud. He didn't have to; he knew it would have wandered through Marella's brain.

"Roger that, Birds Eye," Marella said. "You want to camp at La Presa, we've got cots and hot meals. Lots of coffee."

"And FBI," Hawke reminded her.

"Right," she said. "Sorry about that. Why don't you head home or wherever you think is safe to camp? We may need you again in the morning."

Hawke didn't really want to come back. This kind of search, the endless circling of a particular area was better suited to the FBI than it was to the Firm or the Airwolf team. Maybe it was better to hold those thoughts for when he wasn't so tired and likely to say something he might regret later.

"Roger that, Angel Two."

"I'll let La Presa Control know you're leaving," Marella said, as if she understood. "We appreciate your assistance."

"Birds Eye View out."

Stretching his neck and rolling his shoulders to release some of the tension, Hawke sighed. And then increased the pitch of Airwolf's main rotors, climbing steeply to an altitude where it'd be safe to open up her throttle and maybe even kick in the turbos. The idea of camping somewhere not too far was appealing, but Caitlin was looking forward to a good night's sleep in a real bed and after three nights on a jail cot, so was he.

"They're gone, aren't they?" Caitlin said, somewhat forlornly, as they raced north back home to the Lair, to Van Nuys and to Eagle Lake. "They probably killed the one guy we know of, and then left the area."

"Yup," Hawke agreed.

"Without that helicopter, we've got no evidence tying those other two guys to the attack on Michael, do we?

"Nope."

She sighed. "Think we're ever going to catch them?"

Hawke hated to think of the odds against it, tried thinking of an answer that didn't sound as cynical and pessimistic as he often tended to be. He finally decided on honesty.

"I'd rather not think about that right now."

"Hell and damnation," she said quietly.


	14. Chapter 14

_**Author's Note:**_ This is the beginning of the long overdue conclusion to Achilles Heel and I offer my sincere and heartfelt apologies for the significant delay. I actually had the concluding chapter written but had to write the bridging chapters between where Chap 13 ended and where the Conclusion began. Long story short: I started a new job at the very beginning of Jan 2007 and literally have been almost completely consumed by it since. I've only managed to start writing again in the last few weeks. Thank you to all who wrote and encouraged me to finish the story, and especial thanks to Deb Drake who has been trading me bits of her own Airwolf stories as incentives and rewards to get this done.

* * *

It was a Jeep, an old one, the red paint dulled by the unrelenting glare of Southern California sunlight. From his place a thousand feet above the swarming technicians, Hawke could see the tire tracks that had wound around the northwestern base of San Miguel Mountain before the Jeep was pulled off, hidden in scrub, its license plates removed.

"Figure they walked the rest of it," Santini said sourly. "Sweetwater Spring ain't but a couple hours on foot. Probably had another car waiting or something."

"Or something," Hawke agreed. He was too far up to really see what the people swarming over the jeep were actually doing but couldn't quite dredge up enough interest to drop the few hundred feet necessary to literally oversee their activities.

"FBI's fingerprinting the jeep and the local Sheriff's office is running the registration," Marella's voice filtered through the radio.

"Oh, it'll be stolen," Caitlin said, almost under her breath, but loud enough to draw a sigh from Marella on the other end.

Hawke shot Caitlin a quick glance. Under the helmet her face had a grim set to it, eyes narrowed in professional appraisal of the situation. She was shifting her focus between the topography map spread in her lap and the ground below

"Came off that trail, the _first_ one, crossed Proctor Valley Road and picked up one of these trails around San Miguel," she said softly. "Circled around the base of the mountain, abandoned the Jeep and walked away, as neat as you please, from every bit of evidence tying them to the attack."

Just as she'd predicted the previous night, or earlier that morning, Hawke thought.

"We should've headed north." Caitlin turned to face him, voice dull with guilt.

"La Presa Control told us they had the roads covered," Hawke reminded her.

"Not your fault, Airwolf." Marella sounded angry. "You found our bird and you found the trail. We had over fifty people on the ground and at all major checkpoints. Just too much ground to keep foot traffic contained."

Except, if they'd gone north, they might have picked up the bogeys on infrared, found them by body heat if not by the heat of the Jeep's engine. And while that wouldn't have been enough to tie the men to the attack on Archangel or the burning helicopter -- at least not in a court of law -- those who worked in the more shadowy aspects of the government didn't always play by the same rules of evidence or interrogation. Hawke felt even less compulsion to do so.

He sighed.

"So now what?"

Trust Dominic to put frustration to words. No helicopter ever made could find their quarry now.

Hawke's "We're done here" overlapped with Marella's "We'll take it from here."

Hawke shifted his feet on the pedals, let Airwolf swing a little side to side.

"We'll take it from here, Airwolf," she repeated.

Hawke nodded at the exhaustion in Marella's voice, dipped Airwolf's nose and then eased her to the right.

"You know how to get in touch."

With a last glance at the people on the ground, the marked vehicles from the local sheriff, the unmarked dark colored sedans that might as well have had FBI in big white letters painted on the roof, and two white helicopters, Hawke turned homeward.

Silence reigned in the cockpit. Caitlin was studying the maps, probably more out of frustration than any real need to better understand the territory. It was far enough south to be unlikely they'd return to the area and there was nothing left to learn. Airwolf had done its job: the bogus Airwolf, or its wreckage, had been found. That the perpetrators had walked away gnawed at Hawke in a way that antacids could do nothing to assuage. Damned if he knew how the supposedly competent people who'd searched the area for days without luck and then had let two killers walk right by them were actually going to track down the elusive bastards who'd left a body in one burning helicopters and left two critically injured bodies in another downed bird. If the cannon fire hadn't tagged the fuel line and essentially drained off most of the av-gas, Angel One might have also burned.

Hawke rubbed his nose almost unconsciously. It had taken hours to get the smell of burning flesh out of his nostrils; it would take much longer to erase it from his mind. Bivouacking at the Lair had provided clean desert air and a few hours of blessed sleep but what he craved now was pine scented mountain breezes and the wind off his lake.

"String?"

Hawke hmmmed in response. He had been watching the scope since they'd left San Miguel Mountain, near on thirty minutes ago, half-expecting this typical governmental thank you for the hours they'd put into the search, not to mention the days he and Dominic had sat in jail to support the Firm's operation in DC.

"Yeah, I see it."

Caitlin looked up from the map, looked over her shoulder at Dominic, then to Hawke, back to Dominic and then focused on the control panel in front of her.

"So what are we going to do about it?" Dominic demanded.

Hawke checked the fuel and scowled, trying to decide how far he wanted to lead this wild goose chase before disappearing off radar. He nosed upward and began climbing at a sedate pace, one that he hoped wouldn't seem anything other than a normal course correction.

"String?"

Hawke was still calculating burn rates and fuel consumption.

"Dom, you got LAX's traffic pattern grid?"

Not a question as much as it was a suggestion, a trigger to get Santini thinking, which he would after the requisite few minutes of sputtering why this was a bad idea, a very bad idea, and did he mention that this was the craziest thing Hawke had done ever, or at least in a very long time.

Caitlin, in the counter measures seat, was scanning data.

"Lady says it's a Squirrel," Dominic called from the back seat.

"CHP, San Diego PD, LAPD and LA County Sheriff's office all use AS350s," Caitlin grumbled. "Along with Customs, Immigration, DEA and Lord knows who else. On the plus side, we can outrun a Squirrel without even breathing hard."

Hawke reconsidered hiding in the LAX briar patch.

"Aérospatiale still a French outfit?"

"Well," Dominic hesitated. "Yeah, String, but you heard Cait. US Government agencies, police departments, heck, television stations fly that bird."

"Okay. Let's see which it is."

His hands were already in motion, collective and cyclic pitch increasing, driving Airwolf faster and higher. He could hear Dominic grumbling from the engineer's position, noted peripherally Caitlin's flattened lips and set expression. She wasn't happy and had arrived at the point of frustration where she was anxious to share that lack of happy with anyone who prevented her from solving the problem of who had been flying that Airwolf wannabe and why.

Climbing steadily, pulling back on the controls and flying into the sun, he completed the half loop, executed a half-roll and then into another half loop, diving down and on the Squirrel's tail. Then he thumbed the radio.

"LaPresa, this is your _Airwolf's_ Eye view. Come in, La Presa."

Caitlin half-laughed, which took the angry pinched look from her face for at least a few moments.

Hawke took the almost thirty seconds he waited for a response to get a tail number from the steel gray AS350. The helicopter carried no distinctive markings of a local or federal government agency, nor that of a television station or local transport company. Its very blandness was almost enough to make the back of his neck itch.

"Go ahead, Airwolf."

Hawke grinned as he sidled Airwolf's intimidating bulk close enough along the port side of the AS350 to see the face of its pilot as the man glared across the space.

"LaPresa, an Astar AS350B2 is following us home and we're thinking about keeping it." He gave Marella a moment to catch up mentally. "You got someone there who can run a tail number and see if this puppy already has a home?"

This time, her "Go ahead, Airwolf" sounded more like a growl.

"November Six Three Four Eight Romeo."

"Airwolf confirm: November Six Three Four Eight Romeo."

"That's a confirm, LaPresa."

Hawke stared across the gap at the other pilot, who was dressed in the most basic of civilian garb, dark trousers and a light colored, open-necked button-down shirt. Not young, not old, maybe a few years older than Hawke, the man's brown hair was short but not military short and across the distance between the two helicopters, he appeared calm and matter-of-fact about the vaguely threatening armed attack copter keeping pace with him. Hawke could see the pilot's lips moving, communicating something into the microphone hanging from his headset, but it was too far to make out a word or even the shape of a word. The passenger cabin windows were darkened for privacy, but Hawke'd bet more than he'd happily wager that whoever was in the cabin could clearly see Airwolf.

He waved at the pilot. No reaction.

"Now what?"

Hawke grimaced. As usual, Dominic had a point. They couldn't fly alongside the other helicopter forever and he didn't much like most of their other options. Still, if the pilot or the helicopter had even the slightest possible alliance to those they sought….

"This is LaPresa calling, Airwolf. Come in."

Hawke wondered whether he'd prefer the other helicopter to belong to a known or unknown entity. He hadn't had the chance to chase anything in over a week and his prey instinct was getting a little rusty from disuse.

"Go ahead, LaPresa."

"Airwolf," and that was definitely a growl, "that puppy already has an owner. Looks like it slipped its leash and tried to follow you home."

"You sure about that?" Hawke squinted as he took another look at the Squirrel and its pilot. An overexposure to governmental agencies and their aircraft left him pretty sure that this Squirrel didn't belong to the FBI, DEA, DOD, Customs or any agency he'd seen or heard of. Heck, it didn't even look like Bogard or his cronies in DNS. "It's carrying a civilian registration number."

"So are you, Airwolf."

Which meant what exactly? Hawke looked over at Caitlin and then craned his head over his shoulder to read Santini's expression. They were both tired. Strike that. They were all tired.

"Better keep your dogs on a tighter leash, LaPresa. Might run into a bigger, meaner dog."

Marella sighed. "You made your point. LaPresa out."

Hawke banked hard port and dropped 500 feet, feeling a sudden need to get clear, get home, maybe even catch some sleep. He kept Airwolf in a tight turn to port until she circled around the back of the Squirrel and then he increased pitch, picking up speed and altitude as he blew by the other helicopter, rocking it a little harder than necessary but not enough to put it in any real danger. If he calculated the burn rate correctly, he could fly home along the coastline, which was both a prettier view and had enough traffic to make it difficult to track Airwolf's trajectory.

"Radar suppression."

"You got it."

Hawke switched to Turbos. Gravity's momentary shove against the seat back stirred his blood enough to shake his irritation and any lingering sleepiness. At least long enough to get home.

"So what was that all about?"

Caitlin sounded indignant and he didn't really blame her. He didn't even want to think about the full court press yet to come. At best, he had a few hours before the full weight of the Firm and the rest of the United States governmental agencies looking for Airwolf landed on him in earnest.

"Time to find a hole to climb in," he answered.

"And us without a guardian angel," Santini said softly.

By the time they meandered their way back to the Lair, refueled and ran basic service on Airwolf to Santini's minimum acceptable standards, and then finally flew a circuitous route back to Van Nuys, it was nearing evening. It's Monday, Hawke thought. It had been Thursday morning, -- no, that was CET. It was Wednesday afternoon, evening, whatever, when things had gone to hell. Five full days since Angel One went down and he still had no idea who'd flown the attacking helicopter. He'd let Caitlin fly the Jet Ranger back to the airfield and he'd stepped out, been halfway to the hangar when that niggling thought in the back of his mind resurfaced.

He turned back, pulled open the starboard hatch to the passenger compartment, climbed in and ran his hand over the seat cushion.

"String?"

He could hear Santini calling him and then a distant buzz of conversation between Dominic and Caitlin as they continued to the hangar, ignoring his sudden interest in the passenger compartment.

Marella had sat on her boss' left to protect his blind side, which meant Archangel had sat on the starboard side. Hawke forced his hand in between the seat bottom and the back of the seat, searching, moving his compressed, almost trapped fingers as deeply as he could and then pulling them horizontally towards the middle. It would have been Archangel, he was certain of that, if only for the simple fact that Marella's attire had no pockets to conceal any kind of tracking device and neither of them had opened Briggs' briefcase while in the air.

His pinched and protesting fingers dug down to the metal rivets holding the long bench seat in place. Groaning, he pushed the fingers of his right hand into the seat on the port side, repeating the search and finally dragging his two hands together until they met in the middle.

Nothing.

Hawke swore, softly and under his breath. If he'd been Briggs, that's where he would have hidden a device. No one was watching either of the two Firm officers' hands while they were being transported to or from the Lair. Easy enough to push a small electronic device into the seat cushion.

Hawke checked the cushions themselves for small tears. Then he checked the headrests.

He climbed back out of the aircraft to get a level look at the deck, swept his hand across the carpeting and then pulled it up to expose the steel plating underneath. He reached forward under the pilot's seat and encountered a solid mass of hardware wired in position and unmovable. Mumbling under his breath, Hawke retrieved a flashlight from the hangar without acknowledging glances or questions and returned to the Jet Ranger. The stabbing beam of the flashlight found it within thirty seconds. It took another five minutes to pull it clear.

Five days since Angel One had gone down. Six days before that since that fake Airwolf had 'provocatively intruded" on that CHP helicopter, which meant it had been eleven days since he'd stashed a blindfolded pair of Firm officers in the passenger compartment of the Jet Ranger and given them the opportunity to leave behind yet another small black box.

Hawke turned it in his hand. This one was sticky. It had slid, or been kicked, under the seat and firmly attached itself to the a piece of the hydraulic equipment, hiding right under his seat as he led the Firm to and from the Lair, several times over the last eleven days.

Eleven days since Archangel had planted it and he'd done nothing to recover Airwolf in the six days before he was attacked. More curiously, Marella had done nothing after the attack on Archangel.

Hawke frowned at the little box, holding it between thumb and middle finger and raising it into better light. It was a solid box, no visible screen, entirely encased. Denny would love it and Hawke would need to know its capabilities. Briggs hadn't left this one as a decoy. This one did something. Hawke just didn't know what it was yet.

He replaced the carpeting and tidied up the small mess he'd made before walking slowly, pensively toward the hangar. He held the latest bit of Firm electronics betwixt his fingers.

"You're not going to believe this!"

Hawke looked up, surprised by the brightness of the interior lights and amused that Santini had essentially used almost the exact phrase he'd have chosen. He raised the hand with the device in it so that Santini and Caitlin could see.

"They want us back on that Paullina Prince movie." Santini's grin couldn't have been wider or more delighted. "Apparently, _someone_ convinced the director to do mostly interior shooting over the last few days, but now they're ready to pick up where we left off." He waved a hand at the dull beige answering machine on this desk, on which a small red light blinked incessantly. "They've left three messages from this afternoon alone. We're on location tomorrow at seven."

Hawke groaned.

"Hey, what's that in your hand?"


	15. Chapter 15

Chapter Fifteen

It had taken Denny Coyle almost two full days to make heads or tails of the present Archangel had left on the Jet Ranger. The man was a mass of tics and twitches, scratching at the back of his neck with one hand while he waved the transceiver in front of Hawke with the other.

"It's just a tracking device," he said, with a slight hint of surprise that concerned Hawke. "Except that it's not."

Hawke had gone alone to Denny's shop first thing Tuesday morning and had spent an increasingly anxious two days waiting for the man's assessment. He'd been hoping for something a little bit more comprehensible.

"You see," and Denny held it so that Hawke could see, if he knew what he was looking at, "it sends, it broadcasts a signal, but not continually. That's the beauty of it. It broadcasts a signal, but it varies the interval between transmissions. Whatever is receiving that signal can track it as it moves." He waved it under the lighted magnifying glass that was bolted to his overcrowded desk via a complex set of hinged arms. "I don't know why they vary the interval but that makes it a little harder to find or jam because it's not predictable. There's no pattern or at least not one I've figured out."

Hawke pushed his hands in his pockets and shifted uneasily.

"How would they track it?"

Denny's tics became more pronounced and one of his knees started banging steadily against the leg of his chair.

"I'm not exactly sure. It acts like a satellite signal, something like a satellite phone but I haven't seen anything exactly like this before."

"Prototype?" Hawke asked, amused and yet not, thinking of Archangel's satellite phone and that tracking device the man had been testing in his cane. Proprietary technology, he'd said at the time.

Denny's head jerked up from where he'd been focusing on the innards of the device, eyes wide and white-rimmed. He leaned forward over the desk, hiding the device from view, and inclined his head in Hawke's direction.

"I don't think we're supposed to have this," he whispered with an anxious glance around. "I think I can get into a lot of trouble with the wrong people with something like this." He glanced around again, this time checking the area, mostly shelves, behind him. "You know. The alphabet people."

Hawke snorted.

"Then they shouldn't leave their toys in my helicopters. Can you put it together again? I have some signals I'd like to send with it."

* * *

Considering the parties involved, the approach, when it came, had been subtle.

Hawke, had he been in the mood, might even had admired the Firm's tactic of waiting until he'd had four days of contradictory directions, inane reasoning and all of his other least favorite bits of movie flying to break his spirit before they'd approached him.

Oh, they'd been around. He had noticed the new faces at the Airfield and on the movie set almost immediately. The agents were good, dressed to blend and were seemingly engaged in actual essential functions, but Hawke _knew_. The middle-aged women who'd worked the concessions stand weren't the same ones who'd been there a week ago and they were just a little too alert to be believable. They watched everyone with a casual intensity that Hawke recognized. Half of the security team working the location shoot was new: young, fit men – and one or two women -- who were of a slightly higher caliber than the universe from which the security team was normally harvested.

The Airfield had its share of shadows: visitors and new delivery trucks, and they – all three of them – had had a tail to and from work every day, ground or air vehicle as required though Hawke's personal tails usually dropped back at about the halfway mark between Van Nuys and his cabin. He wasn't sure what they did after that but they were waiting for him in the morning near enough to the same point at which they'd pulled off that the surveillance appeared to be 24/7.

Still, for ninety-six whole hours, the government of the United States had done no more than observe.

This time Hawke went silent, a conspicuous and sudden silence, when he saw the white stretch Lincoln as the Jet Ranger approached Santini's hangar. His companions, after a long, slow whistle from Santini, had emulated his silence. Then he'd slammed out of the helicopter and stalked towards the hangar, ignoring the chauffeur who scurried around to the passenger door of the car. Hawke had consumed half a cup of pure grade bitter crude masquerading as coffee before Laban crossed the threshold of Santini Air.

Laban stood, alone and silent, until Hawke raised his head.

"I was advised that dropping in on you at your cabin would be a gross misstep."

Hawke grunted an affirmative and studied the other man. The navy blue suit was well cut but it was obvious the man had been in it for the better part of the day, possibly longer. Though fair-haired like his predecessor, Laban's skin pinked in the sun and as Hawke studied him, he wiped at his face with a handkerchief. Perhaps California didn't suit him as well as he'd hoped.

"There's a matter I'd like to discuss with you, Mr. Hawke. Might I interest you in joining me for dinner?"

Hawke arched an eyebrow. "Tonight? Kind of short notice."

Laban smiled briefly and gave a short laugh. "Short notice is the only kind I have, unfortunately. Over the last few weeks, I've realized…" He stopped abruptly. "If you're unable to join me for dinner, perhaps I can take a few minutes of your time now."

Hawke glanced around, shrugged and led the way into the office.

"Coffee?"

Laban had followed him in and Hawke glanced behind him, surprised that Santini and Catilin had still not appeared.

"If it's that crude oil floating in your cup, I'll pass."

Laban pulled one of the chairs away from the desks and turned it so that he could sit facing Hawke. He lifted his briefcase onto his lap, rested his hands atop it and then openly grinned.

"You move in some impressive circles, Mr. Hawke."

"Yeah?" A scowl.

Laban's hand brushed some dust from the top of his briefcase. "You have more than a few people wondering how and why a retired Federal Court Justice, one with an impeccable reputation and no small amount of influence, would step in on your behalf."

Hawke grabbed a chair, sat and leaned back in it. "Friend of friend of a friend."

"Probably best that I don't look too far into it," Laban said mildly. His lips firmed and his expression grew more serious. "I won't pretend to understand whatever working arrangement you've had over the past few years with Archangel, other than to note that it appears to have been mutually beneficial."

Hawke was struck with the sudden image of Laban attempting to sell insurance. Somewhat oddly, the image fit.

"If I understand correctly, the Firm hired you to recover Airwolf from a Dr. Charles Henry Moffett after he'd stolen the aircraft, taken it to Libya and damn near instigated World War III."

Hawke settled the legs of the chair on the floor. "You forgot to mention Moffett's attack on Red Star."

Something flared within Laban's eyes but his voice remained composed. "Trust me, Mr. Hawke. _No one_ at the Firm has forgotten Moffett's attack on Red Star."

Hawke waited a moment in surprise, and then nodded. Laban seemed grateful.

"I understand that you refused the Firm's offer of $1M, choosing instead as your recompense information leading to the return of your brother, St. John Hawke."

Hawke shifted his shoulders. He'd been sure where this was going and was suddenly less sure and wondered where the hell Santini and Caitlin had gone. Dominic had sure picked an inconvenient time to be considerate about giving Hawke privacy.

"The deal was Airwolf for St. John."

Laban opened his briefcase and removed a folder, flipped it open and glanced through three pages before returning his very focused attention to Hawke.

"I know Archangel pretty well, and definitely well enough to know that he would never have made an guarantee that the Firm could return your brother. His notes," he waved a piece of paper, "indicate that in his assessment, the probability that the Firm might unearth sufficient information to conclusively determine what happened to St. John Hawke after he went MIA, much less recover his remains, was less than ten percent."

Hawke stood abruptly and turned away from Laban to control his sudden emotional surge. He poured more of the oily sludge from the coffee pot into his mug to cover his reaction.

"You trying to renegotiate with me?"

Laban waited until Hawke retook his seat, watching him with a careful, almost concerned look.

"Did you ever wonder why Archangel would negotiate a deal that he knew he had no way to close?"

Hawke thought back on his return to his cabin post-Libya, the raw emotions of Gabrielle's death, how he'd startled when he'd entered the cabin and found his artwork returned, intact and in place. He gave Laban a lop-sided grin.

"What makes you think that it was Michael setting the terms?"

Briggs had done a lot of talking. After he'd given Hawke the folder that contained nothing new about St. John or his whereabouts, Briggs had pitched hard, giving Hawke every reason under the sun to cooperate with him.

"Because Archangel got _exactly_ what he wanted out of that deal, Mr. Hawke."

"He didn't get Airwolf back."

Laban shrugged and his eyebrows rose. "What makes you think Archangel ever wanted Airwolf back?"

So this is what an earthquake feels like, Hawke thought, as his internal foundations shifted.

"Certainly, the digging I've been doing since I got here doesn't lead me to that conclusion. Archangel got Airwolf for his operations. He had indirect control over who else had access to Airwolf – and equally important from his perspective – who didn't get access. He got a rather unique pilot and all that for the bargain price of giving you occasional, negligible information about your brother, probably nothing that you didn't already know, and maybe doing a little rumor validation."

Hawke noticed that Laban didn't mention how Archangel had run interference with other government agencies and provided supplies – av-gas, armament, replacement parts and upgrades – to the tune of hundreds of thousands, maybe millions, of dollars. There was a fine line between assessing your predecessor's motivations and calling the man a traitor and apparently Laban wasn't willing to cross that line. At least not with Hawke.

Hawke silently absorbed Laban's pitch, considering the fairly persuasive argument he'd been given against what he knew about this man, which was next to nothing.

"So you _are_ trying to renegotiate with me," he concluded.

To his credit, Laban didn't squirm or shift under Hawke's steely gaze. Instead he appeared almost oddly remorseful.

"Actually, no."

"No?"

Laban shook his head.

"Keep in mind that Archangel and I have different objectives. We've discussed his." Laban gave Hawke a sideways slanted half-smile. "_My_ objective is to get Airwolf back. I'd like to do so as soon as possible and I think I can do that best by honoring the original terms of the deal."

Hawke cocked his head in disbelief as Laban extracted a large, overfull and overflowing folder of information from his briefcase. It was held together by four oversized clips to help contain the sheer volume of pages stuffed into it.

"Here is a copy of everything the Firm knows about St. John Hawke, reported sightings after he was declared MIA, the status of other members of his unit that went missing, and sworn statements from every repatriated soldier who might have seen him."

Hawke just stared at the folder. It had to be four inches thick. Maybe five.

Laban extended the folder and Hawke took it, then opened it slowly and shuffled through the top five pages. He'd never seen any of this before. There were hundreds of pages of information, and he'd never seen it before. He didn't hear Laban shut his briefcase, but the motion as the other man stood caught his eye.

"Take your time. Review everything in there and then give my office a call and we can talk."

Hawke stood, both hands still wrapped around the folder, and tried to control his voice, keeping it level by sheer will. "You're telling me that Michael had this information." He lifted the folder. "All this time, he had all of this information?"

Laban sighed, started to answer and then stopped, apparently rethinking his reply. Finally he raised a hand.

"I don't know. I honestly do not know when all of that was accumulated or how long Archangel has had it. I don't even know whether he was aware what was in the file." He gave Hawke a thin smile. "Keep in mind, Hawke, Archangel had an entirely different set of objectives than I do. After all that's happened," he swept a hand out in a broad semicircle, "the Firm just wants the Airwolf situation resolved. If that means a concerted effort to reopen a number of MIA or POW cases, so be it."

"I'm going to kill him," Hawke muttered.

"No," Laban said abruptly. "No, you won't." His smile was very strained. "First of all, I wouldn't let you," he said softly. "But more importantly…"

His voice trailed off and Hawke was startled by the expression in his eyes.

"Someone else has already done a pretty good job of it." He clenched his jaw and gave Hawke a hard, flat stare. "Let him be, Hawke. You go anywhere near Archangel and the Firm will renegotiate the deal the hard way."

* * *

Hawke had stalled as long as he possibly could.

He'd chopped enough wood to burn a blazing fire through the whole week, pulled together a dinner of rice and beans from the supplies in his kitchen – too rattled for the stillness of fishing – and yelled at Tet the third time he'd tripped over the damn dog. Considering Tet's habit of sprawling in one place and staying there, Hawke knew even as he was yelling that he was being unreasonable. Tet's misfortune was in his choice of spreading his leggy limbs between the coffee table and the fireplace; the coffee table was where Hawke's attention kept straying.

The folder sat on the coffee table; an innocuously misleading stack of papers that would have seemed more at home in an accountant's or a lawyer's office. Hawke was dying to read it and he was terrified to read it and his emotional compass swung wildly between uncontrollable rage that Michael had kept this from him and an overpowering fear of being disappointed yet again.

Disgusted with himself for allowing himself to fall victim to the Firm's manipulations once again, disgusted at the way his hands shook and the wine danced into the glass instead of flowing in a nice even stream, Hawke finally willed himself onto the couch and consciously reached for the folder.

Despite its overflowing nature, it was more organized than he'd thought or even hoped. Each section was clipped together and apparently organized by the information source. Hawke picked up the first section, a history overlaying St. John's recorded missions, dates and military records with other operations going on in Vietnam during the same period, and began to read.


	16. Chapter 16

Getting into the clinic wasn't difficult. Getting access to ICU was proving to be more of a challenge.

Hawke gave a bored sigh and lifted the folder again, waving it in front of the two suit clad holster-wearing guards who stood outside the entrance to ICU from the sterile white anteroom that served as a hub for elevators, stairs and corridors interconnecting ICU with the rest of the clinic. Hawke didn't miss that the guards' holsters were filled with nine-millimeter automatics, neither of which had a strap securing it in the holster, a strap that might delay a quick draw.

"Look, I'm just the courier. I was told to put this in Marella Duval's hands, her eyes only, and that she needed to review this before morning. I _can't_ give it to you to give to her. I _can't_ leave it with you. I give it to anyone but Marella Duvall and it's my ass."

The two guards exchanged a considering glance and Hawke sensed their resistance weakening. The folder, equipped with some brightly colored stickers with initials as cryptic as Hawke could recreate from memory, was the wedge. Now he just had to use that wedge to drive an opening.

"This came straight from Laban," he said with a sincerity that he didn't have to fake since he was waving the very folder Laban had handed him approximately 34 hours earlier. "Marella needs to read this and have some answers ready for the Committee. You sure you want to get in the way of that?"

The guards came to some unspoken agreement and the one of the left, the ex-Marine sporting a high and tight, nodded.

"Give me your ID."

Hawke handed him the Firm's security card that he'd been issued to facilitate his visits in and out of Knightsbridge and which had gained him access to the more public areas of this private clinic, and then waited as the guard headed into ICU. It'd been some time since he'd last worn a suit and tie and he reminded himself firmly not to play with the tie or show any indication that he wasn't exactly what he claimed to be. He had already taken a leap of faith that Marella would be at the clinic; it was just past three in the morning but he was fairly sure that had been her car in the parking lot and the guards apparently expected that Marella would be right where Hawke had theorized she'd be: at Archangel's bedside.

He shifted in apparent boredom and glanced at the remaining guard.

"It's kind of cold for a hospital, isn't it?"

The guard gave a fatalistic shrug. "Get used to it."

The place was empty, beyond quiet, an almost echoing type of silence broken only by the soft-footed steps of a technician who pushed a cart laden with equipment down one of the corridors leading away from ICU. Hawke shivered. It wasn't a comforting kind of silence and it was a long five minutes before the guard walked back through the doors from ICU.

The man gave Hawke a skeptical look expressing his obvious personal doubts about the wisdom of allowing Hawke inside.

"I have to escort you in."

Hawke covered the instinctual breath of relief with a yawn, exaggerated it for effect and followed the guard into ICU. Midway, they passed the nurse's station that supported ICU and the nurse, sleek dark head bent over a sheaf of papers, looked up in some surprise and then scrutinized Hawke. Hawke raised a hand as if to wave, but also to block his face from easy perusal. He'd been in this ICU before and not as a visitor, but it wasn't the best time for anyone to call out his real name.

There were only 4 units in the clinic's ICU, two on each side of the corridor after the nurse's station. The corridor terminated in a windowed wall and a collection of chairs and low tables, none of which was occupied. Only the steady tread of their footfalls broke the pervasive, almost unnerving silence.

The guard walked to the second door on the right, knocked softly and then pushed the door open. He stood by the door, watching Hawke with a steady gaze and Hawke wondered if Laban's promise or threat had been for real. And then Marella was in the doorway, holding his ID in her hand.

"Sam Cashman?"

Hawke shrugged. He'd taken some liberties with the card, not knowing if his own name would set off any troublesome alarms.

Marella sighed and waved the ID card at the guard. "It's alright, Wallace. I apparently need to review some material with Mr. Cashman. I'll walk him out when we're done."

The guard nodded, but gave Hawke another once-over before leaving as if committing him to memory.

Marella was dressed casually, an oversized white sweater that looked warm and cozy over a pair of slightly wrinkled white silk trousers, garb that looked comfortable enough to sleep in if necessary, which, Hawke guessed, was probably the point. He frowned as he realized that he didn't have to look up, even a little, to see eye-to-eye with her. He looked down and hid a smile at her sock encased feet: no shoes, high heeled or otherwise.

The woman herself rubbed her eyes and yawned.

"This couldn't wait?"

Hawke looked at the folder and let the anger that he'd held at bay come to the forefront again. He'd stayed up Friday night into early Saturday reading every scrap of information in the folder, and then gone for a long run. After some sleep, a little fishing to restock the freezer, and a long shower, he'd read through it again, slowly, organizing the material into two essential groupings: what he could use and what was nice to know but of no use practical use.

"You're not the one I came to see."

Unimpressed, she leaned against the doorjamb.

"He's not up for visitors." She glanced at the watch on her left wrist. "Especially at this hour of the morning."

Hawke he stepped forward and raised the folder.

"This look familiar?"

Marella squinted at it. The folder appeared to be one of the pale blue standard Firm folders, with a number of colorful stickers on its top cover.

"I thought it was just your excuse to get in here. What is it?"

"It's what I'm going to use to beat your boss over the head."

Marella cleared her throat and shot him a sharp glance, unimpressed and sliding towards annoyance.

Hawke raised an eyebrow. "You think I'm not serious? I want _Archangel_ to explain what the hell game he's been playing for the past two years. And it better be a good explanation because I've about had it with him, you, and the rest of the goddamn government playing games with my family."

Marella extended a hand and with a huff, he gave her the folder.

She paged through it, scanning half a dozen pages rapidly and frowning.

"Where did you…? Never mind." Her expression soured. "I have a pretty good idea who gave this to you."

Hawke shifted toward the doorway.

"We going to do this in the hall?"

"No," she said in a long exhale, stepping back into the room. "But keep your voice down." She rubbed the bridge of her nose. "I'm not sure what you expect to get from Archangel but you're going to be disappointed. He's pretty out of it on a good day and today hasn't been a good day."

Hawke followed her into a room that was probably larger than the normal ICU room. White walls that normally would have reinforced the sterility of the room's function were warmed by softly muted bars of light recessed into every wall, just below ceiling level. The white tiles in the dropped ceiling were subtly patterned in the manner of a tin ceiling, a pattern reflected in the manufactured flooring that absorbed the sounds of Hawke's shoes, the regular beeps of the heart monitor, and the steady shallow breaths of the room's primary resident.

The bed and the medical equipment surrounding the bed took up the right half of the room. Hawke recognized some of the equipment – heart and arterial monitors, a disconnected ventilator – and noted an abundance of tubes leading from other unknown and variously sized pieces of equipment to the patient.

There was a recliner alongside the hospital bed and from the state of the blanket and pillow strewn across it mid-seat, this was where Marella had been spending the night and not on the couch pushed up against the far left wall. Near the couch was a pale wooden desk and chair, equipped to function as an office away from the office with a large multi-line phone, a pile of neatly stacked folders, some scattered papers and pens. No reason for Firm business to be suspended simply because its employees were in a hospital room.

Briggs was asleep or unconscious, head turned slightly to the right, a plastic oxygen mask covering his nose and mouth. The blanket rested at mid-chest and didn't hide the very un-Archangel like hospital gown, nor the central line near his collarbone.

"What's with the mask?"

Marella led the way towards the desk but Hawke had stopped midway into the room, eyes fixed on Archangel.

"His blood ox is a little lower than the doctors like and he's fighting an infection."

She put the folder on the desk but remained standing, watching Hawke watch Briggs.

"Still going to beat him over the head with that folder?"

Hawke flushed, embarrassed and angry, and instead walked over to the desk, picked up and then dropped the folder. The sound echoed around the room and Marella's eyes narrowed. They both watched the bed: Briggs shifted slightly but otherwise didn't react.

"I told you it wasn't a good day." Marella pulled the chair away from the desk and sat down. "He's been in a lot of pain and is on some heavy meds. You should have barged in on Monday afternoon. He's a lot more alert after dialysis." She turned to the folder.

"Dialysis?"

"Acute renal failure due to near-exsanguination." Marella lifted the folder and sent him a challenging look. "Someone gave you the raw data we've been collecting on your brother. So what?"

This was not the reaction Hawke had expected and he scratched his hairline to buy a few brief seconds to sort out his thoughts. He started with the very basics.

"The deal was Airwolf for St. John."

Marella leaned back in the chair and crossed one white silk leg over the over.

"The deal, after you retrieved Airwolf from Moffett in Libya and elected to keep her, was that the Firm would – unofficially -- provide you with assistance and resources, while the U.S. Government continued to search for your brother." She hefted the folder to almost shoulder level. "As you can plainly see, this is evidence that we've been looking."

"Not one goddamned bit of which you've shared!"

Hawke took the folder out of Marella's hands and opened it, pulling out the 'what to use' section.

"Between April 1968 and July 1973, over one hundred soldiers went missing in a particular hectare – you have the coordinates – and none of them have ever been seen again." He stabbed a finger at the page. "That's in the same general area where I left St. John and Mace."

"A hectare's a pretty large piece of area in a war zone, especially over five years," Marella replied, not unsympathetically. "The Army estimates most of those men were KIA, remains not recovered. Did you think we could send in agents to dig up an entire hectare, half of it rice paddies, in a hostile foreign country to recover their remains? That's a diplomatic effort, and is being pushed, quietly, through those channels."

Hawke, undeterred, reached for the next sheet of paper.

"A Navy second lieutenant who came out of the Hilton said that he was held with a Army pilot, same height, hair color, eye color and age as St. John, and who went down around the same time."

"Not at the Hanoi Hilton, he wasn't," Marella countered. "That Navy pilot had been in a holding camp that wasn't one of the thirteen permanent camps for US POWs. That is where he said he saw an Army pilot that resembled St. John. We've checked military and agency intelligence data from a number of different sources and none of them can verify that there was any camp where he said that camp was located. Satellite imagery of that region doesn't show a camp now, nor does it show any structural remnants of a camp."

Hawke stopped and looked at her. Two examples didn't make a pattern but she'd countered the details without even looking at the reports he held in his hands.

"What did you think, Hawke? That we weren't actually looking for St. John?"

That's exactly what he'd thought.

"Why haven't I seen any of this?" He spread out the sheets of paper on the desk. "This."

"Due diligence." She shrugged. "We pass on stuff that checks out. The vast majority of what comes through doesn't check out. Archangel didn't want you tearing off in Airwolf on half-assed missions to Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia or Burma every time there was a rumor that could involve your brother."

There were very good reasons Briggs wouldn't want Airwolf risked in anything that he hadn't checked out and verified to the nth degree first and Hawke knew that he shouldn't interpret this as anything but the Firm protecting their prototype, but he was starting to have a hard time feeding the fires of the anger that had propelled him to a hospital room in the middle of the night. The anger had been buoyed by hope, hope that some of this was actionable information that would lead him to his brother, and now that hope flickered, desperately seeking a handhold, something to keep it afloat.

A series of abrupt bark-like coughs drew their attention from the folder. Marella was at bedside almost immediately, reaching for a cup with a cover and bent straw. She leaned over Briggs. Hawke could see her remove the oxygen mask and then her back blocked his view until she sat down on the recliner. She was holding the cup up to Briggs' mouth with her right hand while her left stroked his hair away from his face. Hawke could hear murmurs, all Marella.

Hawke wasn't sure he wanted, much less needed, to talk to Archangel any more. He was too busy still assimilating information to know what questions to ask or whether he should even be angry with him .

"He awake?"

"Not really." Her voice was soft and faint; partly an effect of it trickling over her shoulder, partly because she'd lowered her voice to be sickroom compliant. "Well, he's awake, but not really lucid enough for conversation."

Hawke walked toward the bed, watching as Marella continued stroking Briggs' sweat-dampened hair back from a face that was still terribly pale.

"Michael, Hawke's here," she said in a tone Hawke had never heard her use before.

Briggs' eye flickered open and his gaze wandered lazily over to Hawke. "Hmmm." He shifted his gaze to Marella and it lingered there.

She lifted the water glass and Briggs moved his head just enough to signal no. Marella replaced the oxygen mask from where it had rested on his chin, fingers tracing his jaw after it was back in place.

As much as Hawke was starting to feel as if he was now interrupting something private, he wasn't entirely ready to leave, still had questions left unasked, but the primary question – _what now_? – might be a little more complicated, might be something he had to figure out on his own.

"You find the people who did this?"

Marella shifted position in the recliner, so that she could see both Briggs and Hawke, took Briggs' right hand with her own and then tucked her legs up underneath her, spreading the blanket across her lap and legs. Hawke shifted in the coolness of the room, noted that Briggs had at least two blankets covering him. He idly wondered if the Firm regulated the temperature of its clinic to suit its feverish Deputy Director.

"We've made some progress, yes." She gave a sharp smile. "We traced a call that was made just after Archangel left the project site up north – we tracked down all calls into and out of that location – and we have a strong lead on the men who piloted that bogus Airwolf."

Hawke walked over to the desk chair, dragged it over to the bed and flipped it around so he could straddle it.

"Took you over a week to trace that call?"

Marella sniffed in annoyance. "Don't be ridiculous. The call trace was simple as was the interrogation of the person who made the call." She smoothed her hair back from her face with her left hand. "The follow-up took time. Let's just say that we know who we're looking for."

This he could handle and bit of action wouldn't go amiss after too long a period of observing more than participating. It'd go a long way towards helping disburse some of the frustration gathered in his limbs like unspent potential energy.

"Give me a name."

She shook her head.

"We've got it covered, thank you." She smiled, this time with actual warmth. "And thank you again for your assistance, both sitting in jail and in the search down south."

"Four days and you couldn't find that aircraft?"

The smile disappeared.

"The forensic team found traces of a camouflage cover, plus there was a lot of cut brush that we found later that morning that appears to have been used to hide the aircraft. The brush had been pushed off the side of the ridge, down into a gully -- we didn't see any of it until full daylight – but between the cover and the brush, it would have been very difficult to see from the air."

Hawke crooked a brow at her.

"Yes, unfortunately. We had to do a dental match, but it was a positive ID on Ray Zinn." She looked away, probably unconsciously, and interlaced her fingers with Briggs'. "I don't know if we'll ever truly know the level of his involvement and if any of it was voluntary."

But that was one more name she'd add to the file she kept of Firm personnel injured or killed in Airwolf related events, Hawke knew.

Hawke nodded at Briggs, who'd closed his eye and apparently drifted back to sleep.

"How long until he goes back to work?"

Marella made a funny sound, a burst of air that sounded half-sob, half laugh. She studied Briggs for a long moment before turning her attention back to Hawke and giving him a rueful smile

"Ask me in a month."

Hawke frowned, rubbed his chin with one fist, as he considered what she was not saying as opposed to what she'd said. He decided to approach cautiously.

"What will you know in a month that you don't know now?"

She lifted her chin and met his gaze squarely.

"I'll know what it will take for him to be back on his feet. Figuratively anyway." Her lips flattened in a straight line. "And by then, the Committee will have stopped planning his memorial service."

Hawke growled unconsciously. "Pack of vultures."

"A venue," she said in a distracted tone. "Laban is a good man." She nodded at the folder still sitting on the desk. "Normally. But he's under the gun to prove himself to the Committee under difficult circumstances."

_Click_.

"He recovers Airwolf, he gets to keep Michael's job?"

Marella tossed her head from side-to-side, _comme ci, comme ca_. "It's not quite that simple."

"It can be." Hawke grinned. "I'm not planning on handing her over."

She considered him. "Hawke, this is just the opening salvo. The Firm is going to come after you with everything to recover Airwolf now."

"The Firm? Not '_we_ are going to come after you with everything _we've_ got?'"

"I've taken some leave," she said simply, looking over at Briggs.

Huh. That was something of a departure from the woman who couldn't stand to sit outside ICU and wait, couldn't stand to helplessly wait when she could do something elsewhere.

"How sick is he?"

Marella's eyes were wide and sober. "You have no idea how terrifying the word complications can be when its used in this setting."

So the Firm was going to come after him with everything they had, and he couldn't count on Archangel or Marella for cover. Survive the next month, survive the Firm's full court press and maybe, just maybe, Archangel would resume the reins and things could go back to the way they'd been.

Even as the thought ghosted through his mind, Hawke knew it wouldn't happen that way. That'd be too easy and easy was not a word that applied to his life.

"How bad is it going to get?"

Marella looked grim. "Enough to make Bogard look like a minor pest, in comparison."

"Bogard _was_ a minor pest. He's a pissant and a sore loser."

She laughed. "And a B52 bombing run is just a slalom course we use to train our pilots."

How long? How long would it last? How far would the Firm go?

"Remember what I said at the restaurant?"

He nodded.

"Influence is power, and our influence has been undermined. We took a direct, physical, almost fatal, attack on our Deputy Director of Operations…"

"Like I said, give me a name."

Marella shook her head, frustrated.

"They're just the triggermen. The point is that the people who ordered this campaign," she glanced at Briggs and her voice roughened, "and who ordered an attack on Archangel did so because there was an opening that we ourselves created." She made a face. "Allowed."

Hawke laughed, without feeling the least bit amused. "And you think getting Airwolf back is going to make all that go away?"

"Hawke, maybe it's time." The suggestion was made gently. "It's going on seventeen years. I can't say so officially, but I agree with you that the Army abandoned your brother and the other soldiers that never came back. But _we_ have been actively looking and trying to find him." She bit her lip and turned the full force of soft brown eyes on him. "If we haven't found him, I don't think anyone will."

Hawke turned to look at the folder of information on the desk. _St. John, I've tried. God knows I've tried, big brother_. Still facing the desk, the folder, he cleared his throat.

"So, you really want Airwolf back?"

Marella gave an unladylike snort in disbelief. "Are you seriously asking me if I want to recover the $1B prototype that has been used against us for the past few years?"

"Yeah."

The was a silence, a puzzled silence behind Hawke and he'd bet that she'd narrowed her eyes trying to figure him out, or maybe looked to Briggs, asleep in the bed, for some kind of direction. He wondered how Michael would have played this.

"Of course we want it back," she said slowly.

Hawke nodded and walked over to pick up the folder, then he reached in his pocket and pulled out the 3rd device, the still slightly sticky transmitter that worked with a satellite or some type of proprietary technology. He placed the little black box on the desk and left the room without a backward glance.

_I know you know where she is. And now you know that I know._

_Your move._


	17. Chapter 17

Chapter Seventeen

He'd have to move her. Of course he would move her, and just the simple act of moving her was a risk that he considered and reconsidered the entire rest of the Sunday that he'd visited the Firm's clinic.

The Firm was watching him – and probably more than just the Firm -- and this time if they used Satellite images or an AWACS, he'd have no advance warning. He had to assume that they had the tools and were actively using them against him, which made just moving Airwolf an incredibly risky proposition because he'd never know if they saw him, or when. His opponents were clever enough not to take action until he'd left Airwolf in her new location. Why risk damaging the prototype with a confrontation? He would know only when he returned and found her missing.

The question was, as always, where? Where would Airwolf be safe?

The Lair was ideal – remote but not too remote, the area not heavily trafficked, easy to move her into and out of without having to wrestle with hangar doors, and defensible -- but compromised. Archangel and Marella knew it, or could use whatever they'd collected from the 3rd transmitter to locate it. He'd considered wiring the aircraft to blow. Take out the entire rock enclosure and whoever attempted to 'recover' her to high heaven – gave it serious consideration as a way of keeping her where she was – but the thought of destroying Airwolf, for any reason, left his gut churning and his brain too distracted to think. Sometime during the past few years, he grown attached, far too attached for sanity's sake, to a piece of aviation equipment that would, in the end, cause him nothing but heartache and grief. Hell, had _already_ caused him heartache and grief.

He didn't actually _like_ the location that kept coming to mind. For one, it would always have a negative association. It was farther away than he'd like: it'd be hell to retrieve her on short notice, and all too often he found himself thinking of Airwolf as the ultimate short notice search, rescue – and usually destroy -- helicopter. But the biggest concern was foot traffic through the area. The chances of a serious off-trail hiker stumbling across the most sought-after helicopter in the world, and reporting it to the local sheriff, had the type of irony that normally appealed to his admittedly fairly twisted sense of humor. This time, he just thought the chance of something like that happening would be far too tempting for his own personal Lady Luck to pass up.

They'd finished filming, which was fortunate timing but Hawke knew that Dominic and Caitlin's home phones would be monitored, as would the phones at Santini Air. He forced himself to wait. Archangel and Marella hadn't made a move on the Lair yet. He still wasn't sure why. Laban had been right about one thing: for some reason, Archangel didn't want Airwolf back. Yet.

Monday morning found him at Santini Air, bright and early, earlier than normal and terribly cognizant of the helicopter that had shadowed his on the way into work. Dominic took one look at his face and turned on an old AM radio. Shrill, overly excited voices of the local talk radio station filled the office, echoed about the nearly empty hangar, and would be certain to annoy any government snoops with hidden microphones or directional microphones, something that gave immediate satisfaction to the craggy and constantly underestimated old pilot. Hawke dug out the equipment Archangel had provided after they flew their first mission for him and swept the office for implanted bugs. He left the two he found intact -- disabling them would only alert the watchers that he was planning something -- but he moved them, one closer to the equipment bay and one closer to the bathroom.

They met, heads nearly touching, over the coffee pot.

"The Lair's been compromised."

Dominic nodded his agreement, his expression grim. He had helped Hawke find the Lair when they had the time and space to do it, liked it immensely, but was pragmatic enough to adapt as he had his entire life.

"All right." Santini inclined his head at the blaring radio. "How do we keep _them_ from knowing?"

Hawke gave a half-grin. "I need your help, old friend. Yours and Caitlin's." And then he explained his plan.

Hawke waited until nearly eleven to call the Firm and made an appointment to meet with Laban the next day at Santini Air. He tried not to take inordinate pleasure in making the man leave his office and come to Hawke's turf while Caitlin and Dominic executed his plan, but a smile kept cracking through his stony façade every time he thought about it.

* * *

"It's a test, isn't it? He's testing us."

Marella held the tracking device in one hand as she paced off the five strides from desk to bed and then back again. She looked up in time to see Briggs fumbling to remove his oxygen mask; his right hand was fully able to grab and lift the mask but he was struggling to undo the strap over his left ear with his left hand and its three splinted fingers.

"Leave it on. I can understand you with it on."

Which was a half-truth. Briggs' voice was scratchy and hoarse; the mask further muted it, making him nearly impossible to hear from across the room. She sat down on the recliner next to the bed to increase the chance of making out his words; his frustration at not being able to communicate was contagious.

"No, you can't." He'd ignored her, naturally, and had stubbornly wrestled the mask down to rest over his throat. He cleared his throat. "Where did you store the tracking data?"

"In a file on your computer. Encrypted and password protected." She smiled. "It's in the 1979 employee performance review subdirectory."

Briggs frowned. Organizing his thoughts into coherent sentences seemed to take more time and effort than Marella could explain away by the painkillers, or the pain itself. Each thought seemed a conscious effort to achieve clarity.

"With last week's date?"

"I backed up your entire system. Everything has last week's date." She leaned against the bed, resting her head where the railing had been lowered and sighed in pleasure as his hand found its way into her hair, gently stroking it, fingers playing with her curls. "I hear Laban visited you earlier. Did he say anything about Airwolf?"

Briggs made a short exhalation, frustration and irritation.

"He wanted to know if Hawke had been by."

Marella jerked her head up off the bed, caught both the annoyance in his expression and some of her hair in his fingers. She winced and then laid her head back down, watching his face.

"I fractured my leg, not my brain," he complained.

"And your pelvis, ribs, collarbone, and three fingers." She rolled her eyes at him. "Not to mention the damage to various internal organs, some of them quite useful. What did you tell him?"

"That I'd heard Hawke had visited me when I was at UCLA, but obviously I didn't remember it."

Marella smiled but Briggs scowled down at her.

"And then he told me you'd taken a leave of absence."

_Uh-oh_. They hadn't had that discussion yet for the very logical reason that he'd been asleep or too drugged for conversation.

"Which explains how you've been able to spend so much time here," he said expectantly.

Marella sighed and sat up so she could face him. She hadn't exaggerated with Hawke. The dialysis did make an immense difference in Briggs' alertness and energy. He was still fighting the infection and his eye was bright with fever, but on the whole, he was lucid, if not yet anywhere near his usual conversational ability. At least for the period of time until he needed another treatment while they waited – hoped – for his kidneys to recover.

"Zeus caught me kissing you."

Briggs slowly closed his eye and exhaled in frustration. "Shit."

"And then Mom came to visit." At his expression, she clarified. "My mother."

She watched him puzzle it out, saw from the facial wince when he'd remembered.

"We missed the …"

"Not really important, considering…"

"Their fortieth wedding anniversary?"

Marella touched his shoulder gently. "Michael, nearly dying in a helicopter crash bought you a very large Get Out of Jail Free card for family events. Even important ones."

She listened closely as he took a relatively deep breath and only coughed a little afterwards.

"She was worried about you. Both Mom and Dad were."

"They were worried about you," he countered.

"And me," she conceded.

She was grateful that she wouldn't have to fill in all of the blanks for him. Zeus had let the kiss and the relationship be tabled for resolution within a dictated timeframe, repercussions to follow, but had kept it to himself, as far as she knew. But a visit from Marella's mother to her injured boss had sent tales wagging and gossip had wended its way from the clinic to Knightsbridge within a few short hours.

"You were very ill when she came to visit." She took his right hand and clasped it between both of hers. "And talking to her helped me understand that I needed to be here, with you, not at the office."

_T__his is the man you say you want to spend your life with_, her mother had said. _What if you're not going to get _your _entire life? What if this is all the time _he _has left?_

She could see from the furrow between his eyes that he didn't truly understand but was trying to reason it out. She wouldn't explain further, far too superstitious to share her fears until he'd fully recovered.

"Zeus? Laban?"

She squeezed his hand and ventured a smile.

"Zeus is not happy with either of us, but plans to take that up with you when you're better." She smiled more broadly at his grimace. "We have six weeks – well, five now – to come up with a proposed solution where I don't directly report to you and I can work on those alternatives from here just as well as anywhere else."

Briggs exhaled through his nose in disgust. "You're reporting to Laban, not me." He fixed her with a glare. "Or you were."

"I told Laban that I needed some personal time." _If Laban couldn't figure out the rest on his own, he's in the wrong profession._ "What do you want to do about Hawke?"

He pulled his hand away to rub at his eye.

"Honestly?" He sighed. "I don't want to do anything. Eric said that the Committee told him to recover Airwolf, and the hell with Hawke. I'll be damned if I'll make it easy for them."

Marella crooked a brow, wondering if he realized exactly what he was saying, and further wondering if she should have scanned the room for listening devices. There was only so much that could be blamed on high doses of opioids.

"Anyway," he gestured with his right hand at her, "weren't you the one who made the point that the timing wasn't right?"

She bobbed her head in acknowledgment, still not happy at the situation.

"How bad is it going to get?"

He blinked, looked at her inquisitively.

"Just how hard is the Firm going to make life for Hawke? Are they going to take his paintings hostage again? Use satellite imagery to find where he's hiding her? Pursue legal options?"

Briggs was shaking his head as she asked each question, as she came to the one that most worried her because she knew the men and women of the Committee were perfectly capable of it.

"Will they go after Dominic or Caitlin?"

"No." Briggs sighed through his teeth. "They'll push hard but Eric's on the spot for this one. The Committee wants Airwolf back but they also want to see what he can accomplish."

And if Laban failed, he would have sole ownership of the blame.

Marella pursued her lips and remained silent for period of time.

"Michael, you've known Laban for a long time. What do you think he'll do?"

"Eric's clever and ambitious." Briggs yawned and rubbed at his eye again. "I'd beware of wooden nickels if I was Hawke."

* * *

"You gave me a pile to sort through. Most of it wasn't worth the paper it was written on."

Hawke dropped the neatly clipped stacks of paper on the desktop, one after another, five in total, and then looked over at Laban, who'd made himself comfortable on the other side of Dominic's desk. Laban had tilted his head to glance at the pages that Hawke had separated out, eyes running over each quickly, assessingly.

"There's not a damn thing there that makes me think the Firm has any idea of where St. John might be."

Laban sifted through the sections that Hawke had segregated, rifling through each quickly. One brow rose.

"I don't think I ever said the Firm knew where your brother is." He nodded at the papers. "Just that we might have some ideas of where to start looking." He lifted the first selection. "I see that you've read the reports from Lt. Maybury. His recollection of meeting your brother…" his voice dropped into a cautious register, "or someone resembling your brother in a holding camp in mid-1971 appears to be one of the more promising leads we've yet surfaced."

Hawke leaned back in his chair, frowning, watching Laban.

"You got anything on a camp in that vicinity?"

"No." Laban shook his head thoughtfully. "Not a damned thing"

Hawke snorted. "And that's one of the more promising leads you have?"

"Yes." Laban met and held Hawke's gaze. "You didn't think this was going to be easy, did you, Hawke? That Archangel had located your brother somewhere that was fairly accessible where we could pull him out of storage when it suited the Firm?"

"Sounds like something the Firm would do."

Laban nodded in acknowledgment. "Some more than others." He waved his hand over the stacks of paper. "Tell me how you want this to work, Hawke. How do we work together to find your brother, alive or deceased, bring him home and return Airwolf to the Firm?"

Hawke tried not to scowl at the realization that Archangel's replacement was not the idiot he'd been hoping. Instead he shrugged.

"You tell me. What do I call you? Laban? The deal is for the Firm to find St. John."

Laban leaned back in his chair and rubbed a hand along his jaw line thoughtfully, then pulled his briefcase onto the desk, opened it and sorted through some of its contents, whistling tunelessly under his breath.

"Well, we are the government, so there will be forms," he said, almost as if he was talking to himself. He pulled one from the briefcase and pushed it across the desk to Hawke. "This one authorizes the Firm to get a copy of your brother's dental records." Laban held up a hand as Hawke started to talk. "The Army ones are shit, and honestly, I don't have a high degree of confidence that the films they'd produce would actually be those of St. John Hawke. We'd like to get the ones from his personal dentist." A brow rose. "I assume he had, you both had, a dentist that you went to growing up?"

Hawke thought back, somewhat desperately, almost two decades. Yeah, they'd gone to the dentist. His parents had been keen adherents of preventative medicine, including regular dental visits, and Dominic Santini took his responsibilities as guardian after his parents' death even more seriously. Of course, what were the chances that particular dentist was still alive, much less practicing, and what the hell was his name? Dominic would know. Hawke took the form, glanced at it and pushed it to the side where he wouldn't have to think about what use the Firm would make of his brother's dental records, or why Michael wouldn't have already had St. John's records.

While he'd been thinking, Laban dropped half-a-dozen other forms on the table surface between them.

"Legally, we have no authorization to request any of your brother's records. You, as next of kin, can provide us with that. This one's for blood typing. That's for HLA typing – not ideal but useful for exclusionary purposes. Of course we'll need you to donate some blood for comparison."

Hawke studied the forms silently, listening as Laban explained the purpose of each, trying to quell the rising unsettling emotions.

"These are all to identify a body," he said, abruptly, interrupting Laban's explanation of the sixth and final form.

The other man frowned and then taking a breath, leaned back in his seat.

"If your brother is alive and well, he should be able to identify himself. If he is alive and unwell, we might need a means to conclusively identify him."

Hawke drew a breath in, slowly, personifying patience. "_I'm_ the means."

"And if your brother is not alive," Laban's head tilted forward, eyes fixed on Hawke, "and has been not alive for a significant period of time, we are going to need all of the exclusionary evidence possible to make sure that any remains we recover are his." He gritted his teeth. "You can't count on dog tags."

Hawke stared at Laban, at the blue eyes that seemed pale and mild and disconcertingly benign, and forcibly reminded himself that Laban's motivation was as arrogant and ugly as most of the decisions he'd seen made during wartime or the foulest of any compromises Archangel had made in the name of business. 

_Nothing personal._

"Understood."

It was past three-thirty when Caitlin returned from the flying lessons. Hawke had minded the business, answered the phones, booked a few more lessons for Caitlin and for Dominic, and in the long stretches of quiet in between, had scribbled in some of the information required on Laban's forms.

Caitlin brought two mugs of freshly brewed coffee, offered a gratefully accepted one to Hawke, and took a seat beside him at the desk. At her cocked brow and his answering nod, she lifted the coffee mug to her lips and one of the forms for her perusal.

"Forensic identification." She shuddered. "I studied some of this when I was at the police academy and then while I was working, I took some criminal justice courses. I wanted to get out of Highway Patrol and be a detective and I figured some forensic classes would help get me in the door." She shook her head, lips compressed and eyes wide. "Helped convince me that I liked spending time in the air instead." She looked up at Hawke. "Guess I don't have to ask what you boys talked about?"

Hawke scratched the side of his head, just above his right ear, and shivered_. Someone walking over my grave_.

"How'd did Daryl and Wilson like their lessons?"

He'd phrased it fairly innocuously and watched with some amusement as Caitlin fought down a laugh. The two prop jet pilots who'd lost a barroom bet with Santini had been lured into taking a helicopter flying lesson, one each today. Of course, she'd done nothing of the kind, conducting an abbreviated lesson and then delivering the two men to Whitman Airport where they'd happily whiled away the hours in the local watering hole, waiting for Caitlin to return from her real purpose.

"Think they'd better stick to fixed wing," she finally replied, lips still twitching. "Having to coordinate both hands and both feet all at the same time just wasn't their cup of tea."

Or their mug of beer, Hawke thought. Or several pitchers of the local swill. He was pretty sure he would owe Caitlin for putting up with the two of them on the way back from Whitman.

"And you just _know_ they kept cracking wise about flying being easier when you had a stick to grab."

Hawke tilted his coffee mug and she touched hers to his in silent communication.

"Any problem shaking your shadow?" he asked very much under his breath.

She shook her head and then grinned, replying just as quietly. "Think they wanted to give me clear airspace after watching Daryl take the controls. We were pretty much the definition of air hazard."

Dominic arrived nearly forty minutes later, grumbling under his breath and switching between English, Italian and some kind of pidgin innate to Santini himself. He took one look at his two younger and happier co-workers and pointed a stubby forefinger at Hawke.

"You. Owe. Me. Dinner!"

Hawke grinned.

"At Luigi's!"

Hawke shrugged and then nodded his agreement. Dominic had taken on the more difficult task of rigging the charges around the inside of the abandoned concrete mixing plant while Caitlin moved the decoy bird. It would have been a far easier job with both Hawke and Dominic running the wire but both of them shrugging their shadows for that long a period of time would have set off alarms at Knightsbridge.

"They seemed like a nice enough family."

Dominic scowled mightily.

"Those kids. Never a minute of silence the entire flight, constant yabbering, touching, poking. And the Mister and Missus just tuned out their _bambini guastati_, completely ignoring them the whole trip, as if taking a helicopter charter is something everyone does on their way to the grocery store."

Dominic's hand rested on Hawke's recently refilled coffee mug and Hawke bid it goodbye with regret. Catilin had made the pot using some beans she'd picked up a local food co-op and in truth, they had been worth every penny.

"In my day, a Sunday drive out in a car was a big to-do, you know! You packed the whole family in the car, in Sunday best, of course, and took a drive out into the countryside, which in those days, was actual countryside with farms and barns and cows and dirt roads. None of these strip malls that go on forever. In my wildest dreams, I'd have never even conceived of taking a helicopter for a hired joy ride, kind of a family outing in the middle of the week and I gotta tell you, some of those dreams I had were pretty wild."

Hawke noted the smear of dark gray metallic paint on Dominic's trousers, tilted his head toward it and got an answering sigh of acknowledgment from Santini, followed by an expression mischievous enough for Puck.

"You gonna clean up for dinner at Luigi's or complain about your paying customers for the next hour?"

Santini's sly smile communicated all too well his ability to do both.


	18. Chapter 18

_Patience_, Hawke cautioned himself again. It was annoying but took no additional effort to fly a route with another helicopter tagging along somewhere behind you. It took a little effort but usually wasn't all that difficult to shake a tail, unless that tail had some kind of electrical monitoring on your helicopter or had tagged yours on radar. Hawke had used the Firm's own equipment to make very sure that the Jet Ranger was clean of bugs and dropping off radar wasn't a terrible challenge if you didn't mind low altitude flying. But it took patience of the kind that was not innate – at least for Hawke -- to lay a trail for a tailing helicopter. It was a special skill to do enough darting and dodging to make the tail think that you'd tried to shake them, _and_ that they'd fooled you into thinking you'd done so successfully.

It wouldn't do to lead the Firm directly to the target, of course. On day one – Wednesday -- Hawke dropped off radar and tucked his helicopter into the shadow of a ridge ten minutes south of Chula Vista. On day two – Thursday – he'd filed a flight plan for San Diego and had flown down along the coast. He'd turned southeast before reaching even the outskirts of San Diego and had dropped off radar five minutes northwest of the target. Friday, day three, he didn't fly anywhere near it and instead did a cargo job from Van Nuys to Las Vegas. It was a paying job and it had the added benefit of screwing with the Firm's tail.

_Patience_, he advised Santini, who seemed to relish taunting the Firm's tailing helicopters as if it was a game.

* * *

Saturday's weather was warm, sunny, with the perfect amount of breeze to offset the direct overhead rays of the sun beating down on his mountaintop cabin. Hawke mused on the next steps of his plan as he flipped three burgers and stepped back quickly to avoid the flare-up as the fat and/or drippings hit the blisteringly hot coals underneath the campfire grill. His fish, neatly filleted, rested on a sheet of aluminum foil far enough from the burgers to keep the beef from smelling like fish and vice versa, but close enough to bake the white flesh at a consistent level under its glaze of lemon and ginger.

Tet ambled out of the house and stretched his leggy body with an accompanying very vocal yawn that drew laughs from Santini and Caitlin. He wandered over to sniff the grilling hamburgers with a valid interest now that one of those burgers had his name on it. Caitlin's newest 'friend' Jack was unfortunately unable to join them for this impromptu barbecue. He'd made his excuses about a sudden audit that required him to work through the weekend.

"So," Hawke drawled with a lifted eyebrow at the redhead sunning herself on the front steps of his porch. "An audit?"

He waved the long handled spatula at Tet, who scampered back from the fire to a safe distance where he could sit and pant happily with an occasional sniff as the food scents drifted downwind towards him.

She laughed, shading her eyes to look up at him.

"Can you imagine?"

Santini was ensconced in a low-to-the-ground beach chair, pulled close enough to the campfire to supervise but far enough to avoid both the sparks and the responsibility of cooking.

"I suppose it's an all purpose word," he chortled, wiping condensate from the beer bottle in his meaty grasp. "I always thought it meant searching the books. Now we know it also means searching the countryside for a helicopter."

Hawke nodded at Caitlin. "Nice to see you use your skills at attracting the bad guys for our purposes this time."

"Hey," she protested, eyes narrowing in his direction. "Wasn't me that suggested feeding him a little misdirection."

"Misinformation," he said. "Keep it up and Michael will have you working for him."

Caitlin settled back against the porch railing with a satisfied glow. "I look good in white," she said confidently.

Hawke gave her a lazy smile, less amused by the image of Caitlin dressed as one of Archangel's staffers than he was at the idea of her being at Archangel's beck and call or imaging her calling Briggs 'sir.' Despite Archangel's usually relaxed attitude when he was at Hawke's cabin, the Firm was still fairly hierarchical and Briggs expected compliance to the reporting structure and deference to his orders. Hawke wasn't all that sure Caitlin was cut out for sublimation of personal goals in support of organizational ones. The first time Archangel barked an order she didn't agree with, she'd probably tell him so and be out on her pretty white-clad ass within minutes.

"Think they found it yet?"

Mildly annoyed by Santini's interruption of his musings on pretty white-clad women, Caitlin, Marella, Laura, Amanda, Lydia and the rest of Archangel's stable of assistants, Hawke snorted.

"Nope."

He checked the fish, deemed it just about perfect and with a quick grab, pulled the aluminum foil onto a waiting plate.

"I figure at least two more trips to the vicinity before they can triangulate the right location."

"But…." Caitlin's protest was almost immediate, followed by a pause as she completed the thought. "You don't need four geographic points to triangulate."

Hawke grinned as he deftly flipped the burgers from the grill onto another plate. "Well, I don't and you don't. Think Jack can find the location from what we've given?"

Caitlin sighed and fanned herself. "Well, he's cute and he sure knows how to treat a girl right, but Lord, he ain't the brightest boy I've ever met. Based on the people Michael has working for him, I'd have thought he would have been a lot smarter." She smiled and her eyes danced. "Good thing he's cute."

"Uh-huh." Hawke deposited their lunch onto the table pressed into service as a picnic table. "Notice any of Archangel's people around? Looking for the Lady?"

Santini climbed out of his chair and wiped his hands on the front of his trousers, frowning slightly as he did so.

"You know, now that you mention it, I haven't seen a single one of them."

Hawke regarded the burgers with a critical eye and then selected the smallest and tossed it to Tet.

"Laban is bringing his own people in. I think he's planning on keeping the chair he's sitting in."

* * *

Hawke nodded a greeting to the white-clad Vanessa who guarded the exterior of what he still considered Archangel's office. It was nice to see a familiar if not friendly face. Vanessa's smile was purely perfunctory as she intercommed Laban to tell him Hawke had arrived.

He did appreciate the lack of gamesmanship. Laban had him sent in within a handful of minutes rather than keep him cooling his heels to establish dominance.

As he came through the door, Hawke noticed Laban standing behind Archangel's desk and another man sitting in one of the armchairs in front of it. From the back, Hawke could only see that the man's hair was flecked with gray and long enough to curl as it hit the collar of his suit jacket. Then the stranger stood, half-turned, and Hawke was pulled back in time almost seventeen years.

"Captain Dockery." The name rolled off Hawke's tongue as if it was 1969 and he was faced with a tall and lanky Texan in olive drab BDUs rather than a gray business suit.

"Captain Hawke."

Miles Dockery extended a hand and Hawke grasped it, still somewhat surprised that the name had come to him so easily. He'd known Dockery, but not well, and he was trying to remember the all too vague details from half a lifetime ago.

"It's been a long time." Dockery released his hand and sank back into the chair he'd occupied. "You look good. Civilian life seems to agree with you."

That was the other thing he'd noticed about Dockery. Though the man was wearing civilian attire – a gray suit, white shirt pressed to a uniform neatness, no tie -- he carried himself as if he was still military.

"You still in?"

Dockery gave him a half-smile of acknowledgment. "Same government. Different berth."

Hawke's gaze flickered back between Laban and Dockery, trying to read the situation. Laban sat in Archangel's oversized white leather chair and leaned back, remaining silent.

Dockery inclined his head at Laban but kept his attention on Hawke.

"The Firm reopened a butt load of MIA & POW records over the last week. Got my attention."

"Mr. Dockery has been working a number of cases out of Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and Thailand." Laban waved a hand at the other armchair. "Please have a seat, Mr. Hawke."

Hawke turned to look at Laban and remained standing as he wracked his memory trying to fit all the pieces together. Dockery had been the Battalion S2, the Intelligence Officer.

"What kind of cases?"

Laban shook his head. "That's not relevant."

"Drugs mostly," Dockery interjected with a shrug in Laban's direction that communicated he was perfectly willing to make his own decisions and didn't need Laban to run interference for him. It also clearly told Hawke that this man didn't work for the Firm.

"You DEA?" Hawke was surprised. He'd figured Dockery for CIA. His hair was too long for DOD.

Dockery inclined his head and gave a little half-smile. "Let's just say that the drugs are simply a means to an end. I trace the drugs back to the source, find the money, find the influence." He shrugged. "I'm interested in what the drugs are used to achieve."

Hawke shook his head, confused, and glanced between the two mean. "What does this have to do with me?"

Laban leaned forward, rested his arms on his desk. On Archangel's desk, Hawke reminded himself.

"As Mr. Dockery said, at the Firm's request, the Department of Defense re-opened a number of MIA & POW cases."

Hawke raised an eyebrow. "Far as I knew, they weren't closed." He glared at no one in particular. "They're supposed to be open until resolved."

Laban shrugged and Dockery scratched the back of his head. Neither seemed either surprised or particularly moved by his suppressed outrage.

"You ever meet a guy named Zeman?"

Hawke returned his attention to Dockery, shook his head no.

"Delbert Zeman? Special Forces, originally out of Kham Duc?"

Frowning, Hawke shook his head again.

Dockery shifted in his chair, stretched out long legs in front of him and gave Hawke a measured glance. "Just as well. Biggest piece of shit I tracked out of that war. His boots hit the ground in '66 and he was running a major drug supply chain by '67." He gave Hawke a sour grimace. "Kept re-upping. Did three tours. By the time he left 'Nam, he was a multi-millionaire and probably killed more of our guys than the NVA."

Hawke shifted in impatience. He'd known, heard of guys like Zeman and he still didn't have a clue why Laban had asked him to come to Knightsbridge on this beautiful Sunday morning.

Dockery clenched his jaw and then climbed out of his chair, making his way to the window, just to the side of the desk. He looked out the window over the green rolling campus of the Knightsbridge complex for almost a full minute before turning back to Hawke. When he did, his eyes, a previously unremarkable grayish blue, had darkened and his expression was remote.

"When I said Zeman probably killed more of our guys than the NVA, only part of that was by supplying H. I've no idea of how many were killed just because they got in his way." Dockery held Hawke's gaze. "The locals he just mowed down. Men, women, children, grandparents." He gave a tight shake of the head. "Didn't matter. After he finished his official tours of duty, Zeman came home, out processed and went straight back. Had a business to run."

Hawke wished the man would get to the damn point. He'd sit here and listen out of due respect for a fellow vet and because Dockery hadn't been too bad an officer over there. His intelligence hadn't sucked nearly as badly as the S2 who came after him.

"And right now, you're asking what that has to do with you or with your brother," Laban said softly.

Hawke felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up.

Dockery reached into the front pocket of his suit trousers. Hawke heard the jingling sound of metal against metal. It was the wrong sound to be coins, unless they were from a different country. Hawke didn't think they were coins.

"Like I said, Zeman took out anyone who got in his way, but he started to keep trophies after a certain point, especially when it was someone who might have known him."

Another solider, Hawke translated in his head.

"We executed the search warrant on all of Zeman's properties – houses, business offices, warehouses, you name it -- about two weeks ago. We're still processing all of the evidence we found, but after I saw that the Firm had reopened the case on St. John Hawke, I gave Laban a call."

Hawke watched Dockery's hand emerge from the front right pocket of his trousers, saw the sunlight through the window glint off the dulled steel, but had known what it was even before it was in view. Dockery walked over and put the tag into Hawke's hand.

"It's already been dusted for prints," he said, voice full of regret. "I wish I could let you keep it but it's federal evidence in a case we've been working for more than fifteen years."

Hawke ran his thumb along the ridged edge of the tag. It was bent and a little rusty but when he tilted it so that the sunlight hit the engraved letters, he could clearly read it. HAWKE, ST. JOHN, followed on the next line by St. John's Social Security number. Below that, the inoculations the Army had given him and St. John's blood type. At the very bottom, the religion St. John had provided on his Army records.

Hawke clenched his hand around the tag until the edges of it pressed into his skin enough to hurt and blinked from the sudden grit in his eyes.

"Just the one tag," he finally managed to get out in a hoarse voice that sounded nothing like he normally did.

"Just the one," Dockery confirmed. "He may be the one of the most corrupt and disgusting members of the human race I've ever met, but Zeman remembered his basic. He took the one tag, left the other with the body."

Hawke cleared his throat. "How?"

Dockery shrugged, eyes still full of regret and shared pain. "I'm not sure. They could've crossed paths in the jungle on a mission. We have unsubstantiated rumors that Zeman obtained his product directly from a producer in Thailand that may or may not have had American POWs working the poppy fields. I've tried to substantiate those rumors for the last ten years and I've gotten nothing but people too scared to talk and a sack full of lies from those who might know." He growled. "All I can tell you is that your brother got in Zeman's way and Zeman killed him." He met Hawke's hard stare without flinching. "I'm sorry. I really am."


	19. Chapter 19

Hawke was halfway through a bottle of Jack Daniels, one hand clenched around a different set of dog tags, staring into the fire and pretty much ignoring whatever Dominic was trying to tell him. Dominic had been talking to him, talking at him, for the last four hours and none of it – not one word – made a damn bit of difference. He'd throw Santini out of the cabin but he just didn't have the energy. It was just easier to continue ignoring the rise and fall of impassioned English and Italian.

He leaned forward and picked up the single sheet of paper from the coffee table in front of him. After seventeen goddamn years, he didn't even have St. John's actual dog tag, just a pathetically insignificant piece of paper, a photocopy of the dog tag he'd held in his fist six hours earlier and had only reluctantly surrendered after Dockery had promised, had sworn, that as soon as that piece of shit Zeman was convicted, he'd make sure the dog tag ended up back in Hawke's hands. He couldn't see how it mattered to Dockery or the feds. They weren't charging Zeman with St. John's murder or that of the hundreds of other men, women and children he'd killed. They'd built their RICO case against the man and one single dog tag wouldn't affect it one way or another. And really? Why spend that much time and money on Zeman anyway? Hawke hadn't expected Dockery to accept his offer to single-handedly resolve the Zeman case for the government, but he'd appreciated Dockery's honest answer that Hawke would have to get in line, a long line, behind Dockery himself and several dozen members of Dockery's team. Whoever they were.

The edges of the pair of dog tags in his hand started to break through the numbness that had been in place since he'd left Knightsbridge that morning. Unclenching his fist, he swallowed down a surge of emotion and spared a glance at the tags he did have. Late afternoon sun glinting on an angle through the cabin windows picked out the same last name he'd read that morning. HAWKE, followed by the all too familiar STRINGFELLOW.

His eyes slid to the next line. And there they stopped.

He stared at the tags, trying to make meaning of the two separate sets of numbers that appeared under his name.

In the distance, a figurative distance not a literal or physical one, he could hear the pitch of Dominic's voice change. _He's asking me a question. Funny. So am I._

Hawke stared at the tag's second line, at his military serial number and his social security number, and then he lifted the all but blank piece of white paper that carried the image of his brother's dog tag like a secular Shroud of Turin.

"Son of a bitch," he growled.

He learned against the arm of the couch as he staggered to his feet and held the paper in his right hand, his own dog tags in his left, and displayed them both to Santini who was watching him with wide, sorrowful red-rimmed eyes.

"That Son of a Bitch!"

* * *

_Section break_

* * *

There was something to be said for making a dramatic entrance.

Hovering the most widely sought helicopter in the world outside of the office window of the man charged with obtaining her return at 0800 on a Monday morning seemed to be an ideal way to wake up the entire Firm. Hawke was sorely tempted to add a little _sturm und drang _to ensure he had Laban's undivided attention. His fingers twitched over the firing button.

Not even fifty feet from Airwolf's nose, Laban stood at the window of his office -- Archangel's office -- blinds completely open; as hospitable as if he'd opened the doors wide to welcome the Firm's prodigal prototype home for good. Unfortunately for the sake of that image, he had to turn back to his desk to actually communicate with the pilot at the controls of that prize.

"This is Knightsbridge," he said, his voice mild and almost entirely controlled. "Go ahead, Airwolf."

He could hear a glimmer of excitement in the short breaths Laban took as he spoke. Hawke grinned without mercy and wondered briefly if maybe this was how Moffet felt just before destroying Red Star, that intoxicating power to change the lives of those on the other side of that glass for good or ill.

"Like what you see, Knightsbridge?"

Against all advice, against Dominic's pleas and Caitlin's quietly, persistent reasoning, Hawke had come alone this day. If he was going down, he wasn't taking along the rest of his family. So far, however, the Firm hadn't scrambled much in the way of defenses. Some jeeps on the ground within a couple hundred yards armed with shoulder mounted SAMs and a couple of M16s seemed to be it. He'd really have to get on Archangel about the Firm's inadequate response to obvious threats.

"Very much." There was a long pause and then Laban spoke again, his voice carried a hint of sympathy. "I only wish we had been able to conclude things with a more positive outcome. I'm truly sorry about that."

Hawke ground his teeth, fought back a snarl.

"You have no idea," he muttered under his breath. He said, "You might want to take a good look at her, Laban."

He could see others filing into Laban's office through the opened doorway. Men in suits and women in white, all come to see the Holy Grail. One woman, older, African-American, he remembered from the Committee meeting after bringing Archangel out of East Germany. Another man was one he'd seen occasionally during the years he'd been Airwolf's original test pilot. And then there was Zeus, who'd appeared and now made his way through the gathering crowd to stand beside his Acting Deputy Director.

"I'm not sure I understand."

"Oh, I'm pretty sure you don't." Hawke laughed, a sharp bitter laugh edged by a throbbing headache, the consequence of the previous day's self-inflicted alcohol poisoning. "You see, I joined up _after_ St. John. He joined in '67. Me, I had to wait until I was old enough to join without a legal guardian's approval, so that wasn't until 1968."

Laban's brow had a set of fairly deep furrows in it and he was shaking his head as he fended off Zeus's questions, which seemed to be increasing in intensity.

"Funny thing about joining up during that time. The Army was switching over from military serial numbers to social security numbers, and -- I know this because I checked with a couple of VA guys last night – _before_ 1967, the Army used serial numbers and _after_ 1969, the Army used social security numbers…."

He was close enough to see Laban's eyes widening in realization and dismay.

"….but between 1967 and 1969, the Army put _both_ the serial number and the social on the dog tags that it issued to its grunts." He growled deep in the back of his throat. "I should've noticed it yesterday morning but it'd been a while, a long damn while, since I'd looked at a dog tag up close and personal."

And God help him, he'd believed it from Dockery when he would not have believed it from Laban.

He could see the worried glances now from the standing room only crowd in Archangel's office, could see the ones in white backing out of the office, never taking their eyes off Airwolf and clearly remembering all they'd heard about Red Star from those who'd survived it.

Zeus stepped up to the speakerphone Laban had used to patch through to Hawke's frequency.

"_Hawke_…"

"Take a good look," Hawke said with savage pleasure at interrupting Zeus. "Because I'm not giving her back and I'll be damned if I fly her for you after the shit you just tried to pull."

He dipped Airwolf's nose, gave a short bark of laughter as the crowd in the office hit the ground, and then banked hard to starboard, taking Airwolf out of the range of the SAM missiles. He skimmed the trees to impair a clear lock from any guidance systems and departed the Knightsbridge complex before Zeus had even finished climbing back to his feet.

Heart thudding rapidly in his chest, he kept Airwolf just short of maximum speed without turbos. Wouldn't do to lose the three white helicopters that had pealed out after him when he broke away from the scene that he'd so ably staged, one to his aft port, one to his aft starboard and the third one on his six. Hawke hummed in grim satisfaction and led the Firm's dogs on a merry chase south.

* * *

_Section break_

* * *

"What's taking so long?"

Hawke glanced beside him to where Santini lay on his belly, peering through the eyepieces of a pair of Bushnell 12x50mm long-range binoculars. The hillside scrub was overgrown and made excellent cover for two men with an abiding interest in the formerly abandoned but increasingly popular concrete mixing plant outside of Chula Vista, CA.

"Damned if I know. I practically led them to the front door of the place."

He'd 'lost' the three tailing helicopters about five miles north of this place and had dropped off radar almost directly above it. Short of sending an engraved invitation, Hawke wasn't sure how much more of a trail he could lead.

"Wait," Santini cautioned, an edge of excitement to his voice. "Here they come."

Hawke trained his own set of Steiners on the approaching dust cloud, picking out three separate vehicles: a dark colored Suburban, a familiar white limousine and – Good God, they were an arrogant bunch – a flatbed truck long and wide enough to carry a helicopter if her blades were secured.

Santini snorted in laughter as he made out the flatbed.

"Even they know they can't fly her," he said, not without a large amount of pride.

"Yeah, well, that makes them smarter than Bogard."

Hawke sighed and refocused his binoculars as the vehicles approached the exterior gate to the plant. Dominic and Caitlin had left a new padlock on the gates and Caitlin swore up and down that she'd made sure it didn't have either of their prints on it.

The man riding shotgun in the Suburban stepped out, walked to the gate with a set of bolt cutters that could probably cut through the gate's steel posts.

"Overcompensating?" Santini muttered.

Padlock cut, he twisted the lock out of the gate and swung it wide to admit the Suburban, the white stretch Lincoln and the flatbed before jogging back to the Suburban.

Hawke watched as the three vehicles approached the building that at one point in the not too distant past been used to store and sometimes repair the concrete mixing trucks that came and went from the plant like worker bees from a hive, only they left this hive filled and returned to be refilled. It was a massive building, more than forty feet high, with wide bottom rolling slab doors that would allow a freight car to pass through sideways when fully opened. In the recent past, this building had been used to construct the fake Airwolf that had caused so much trouble over the past four or five weeks, and had cost the life of one man, and nearly those of Archangel and his pilot.

The Suburban and the limo pulled to the side of the building, clearing the way for the flatbed to execute a three point turn and then back up until it was just in front of those oversized doors.

Santini snickered and Hawke allowed himself a grin at Laban's unbounded optimism and arrogance.

The man who'd opened the padlock on the gate walked to the massive doors and applied his bolt cutters to the padlocks on each door. Removing them, he put his shoulder against the door on the right and started pushing, without much gain. The Suburban's driver joined him and the two men wrestled the door along its tracks until it was almost fully open.

Hawke turned to his partner in crime. "How did you…?"

"Idiots," Santini grumbled. "They're mechanical and believe it or not, that place still has power. There's a switch in the office if they'd bother to look. Too much in a hurry."

Laban and two others had exited the limo and moved towards the opened doors, peering inside into the dimly lit interior where by squinting, they could just make out the outline of a powerfully intimidating helicopter, painted a distinctive pattern of dark steel gray, almost black, with a white underbelly. Laban turned in obvious excitement to the men who'd arrived in the Suburban and offered his hand to the one who cut through the padlocks.

Hawke sighed. "Now," he said as the first man crossed the threshold of the building.

The interior of the building flashed, incandescent white and then a blinding orange that backlit the men standing in the doorway's opening. The wall of sound that followed was only sub seconds behind the flash and the trailing shock wave blew the men out from the building to the dust of the parking lot, where they landed, rolling and twisting like bowling pins after a particularly powerful strike.

"Boom," Santini said in near silent awe as the valley around them rocked with the echoes of the explosion.

Flames licked out of the windows and skylights of the building and Hawke could smell the paint burning off the sides of the helicopter. He turned to Santini, quizzically.

"How much fue...?"

And dropped to the safety of the dry dust, burying his head in the pebbles and weeds to ride out the earth's near convulsions as the second explosion shook the building and the surrounding countryside with a resounding, sickening, felt deep within the stomach blast. As the echoes of the blast moved outward, he heard the smaller, sharper popping of 40 mm shells exploding. After a sidelong glance at a partially gleeful, partially apologetic Santini, Hawke lifted his head and his binoculars only far enough to do a headcount check on the people Laban had brought with him to recover Airwolf. Most were still on the ground, but they were moving, covering their heads with their arms and crawling for cover beyond the flatbed.

"Shape charges?" he asked, admiring how well the explosion had been contained to the helicopter and to the building. They'd done an impressive job of directing the force of the explosion.

"Yup. Even taught Cait how to lay a few, just like I taught you."

Hawke drew back and looked at his friend in mock outrage. "The hell you did. I showed you."

Santini laughed, quieting after a hurried hand signal from Hawke, who peered through his binoculars again, quickly scanning the ground outside the burning building.

Laban was lying on his side, staring at the burning building and the pieces of the helicopter that had been stored within it, some of which had scattered around the dirt parking area where he lay. Around him, some of the men, his men, were climbing to their feet and dusting themselves off. One held his arm awkwardly and a couple of others had obvious grazes or were wiping streaks of blood from exposed skin. Hawke shook his head in admiration yet again at the controlled fury of the explosions.

He turned to Santini who met his gaze with a lifted brow of query.

He grinned. "Yeah. We're done here


	20. Chapter 20

Her hand emerged from the small handbag with a narrow cylindrical object that made Hawke's eyebrows pop upward in surprise. Rummaging through the bag again, the woman pulled out a book of matches, had the cigarette lit and was drawing on it with obvious pleasure before Hawke could even cross the row of parked cars and take a step toward offering her a light.

"Mrs. Hayden?"

A pair of disconcertingly intense blue eyes shifted to him without the least hint of being caught off guard. She smiled graciously and, moving her cigarette to her left hand, extended her right.

"Mr. Hawke, how nice to see you again."

Smiling despite himself, Hawke caught her hand and shook it gently. She had a firm grip under soft white skin that was neither too dry nor overly coated with lotion and her jewelry was simple: a narrow gold wedding band and wafer-thin watch that was probably worth more than the jeep Hawke had just parked.

She glanced around the parking lot of the Firm's clinic and gave him a disarming smile as she raised the hand that held the cigarette.

"I'd rather we keep this between we two, if you don't mind. Both my husband and my son view it as a filthy habit, conveniently forgetting that they both used to smoke like chimneys."

Hawke tilted his head in consideration. Wouldn't the smoke have yellowed Archangel's wardrobe?

She waved a hand at him. "Of course, everyone smoked then. It was the thing to do, especially overseas where Porter was stationed. Michael was working abroad too, thought we don't talk about that." She smiled again; this time a conspiratorial smile that elicited one in return from Hawke.

_Dear God,_ he thought, _it's inherited. Briggs hadn't learned this as part of his job. It was part and parcel of the man himself, inherited from his mother through nature or nurture, possibly both._

"Have you come to see Michael?"

Hawke brightened at the realization that his entry to the clinic and to ICU had just been considerably eased by this well-timed encounter. After the events of the morning, he'd decided it'd be best to shore up his base and his strongest constituency was still in the hospital.

"If he's up for visitors…" He let his voice trail off, expecting that she'd pick up his unspoken request.

She waved the cigarette again, thoughtfully keeping it downwind from him.

"Just let me finish this horrible thing and we can walk in together." She glanced toward the sky. "It's getting rather late and I think it's time to retrieve my husband and head back to the house." She took another drag. "I'm sure Michael will be delighted to see you though I won't promise that he's anything close to good company. He gets terribly bored and somewhat irritable when he's ill. Always has, even as a child."

Hawke rubbed at his lip, trying to hide his amusement and probably failing.

She exhaled through her nose and the smoke curled around her white hair.

"I'm sure he's ready to send me packing back home too. It's the bane of family, Mr. Hawke. When you're not with them, you miss them terribly, but after a few days with them, you wish you or they were somewhere else."

Hawke felt the grin fall away from his face and shifted in place as she took another, deeper drag on her cigarette.

Without looking at him, she said, "At least that's what my children tell me, which, I think, is their way of telling me when it's time to leave. I'm sorry if I've made you uncomfortable. Michael is far more diplomatic than I am." She gave him a small smile. "As he likes to remind me."

"So he claims," he agreed, less uncomfortable than he might have been if she'd obviously avoided talking about family in front of him. It was reassuring to know that Briggs and Marella respected his privacy enough to keep it.

"Have you tracked down the people who almost killed my son?"

Hawke groped for an adequate answer, mentally congratulating her on a change of subject from the personal and uncomfortable to the professional and uncomfortable. He scratched the back of his neck and considered a number of alternatives.

She sighed, took a final drag from her cigarette and then tossed it to the ground, grinding it into the concrete with the sole of her low-heeled pump.

"That's probably something you can't answer. Let's pretend I didn't ask. I'm supposed to know better."

Relieved, Hawke trailed in her wake as she turned back to the Clinic's entrance, surprised and a little pleased when she hooked her right hand under his left forearm as naturally as if she'd been doing it for years.

"Please forgive my bluntness, but I can't quite place you in the scheme of things."

A sidelong glance confirmed that she was serious even as she offered him a friendly smile.

"I don't imagine that you work for the Firm."

Hawke made a sound, half cough, half laugh, at the idea. Considering the timing of today's events, it was doubtful he'd even gain access to the Firm's Clinic if he wasn't walking in the door right this minute with Archangel's mother. The woman at the central receptionist desk gave him a searching look and though she didn't challenge him, she did pick up the phone.

"No, I didn't think so," she said. "Marella introduced you as friend of Michael's, didn't she? And it struck me then that you didn't seem to fit into Michael's usual categories of friends: political people, horse people, very pretty women, or his older, closer friends."

"We share an interest in helicopters," Hawke said, biting the inside of his mouth to keep from laughing as he pressed the button for the elevator.

"You'll forgive me if I don't share your fondness for those machines," she replied sharply.

Hawke held back the argument that would only have annoyed and not convinced. He could understand the fear and dread she held for something that was, at its most basic, simply a means of transportation. In the wrong hands, in unskilled hands, it was an incredibly dangerous piece of equipment, but so was an automobile. He wished he could explain the joy of coordinating its elements to achieve a hover so natural that one would think humans were meant to stop in midair and survey the earth like gods: from above.

The elevator doors slid open onto the small anteroom outside ICU but what caught Hawke's attention was the elevator just opposite. Just before the doors to that one closed, Laban lifted his head to meet Hawke's gaze with a startled expression of his own.

_Damn it._

Security opened the doors to ICU quickly and respectfully for Mrs. Hayden but Hawke felt the heat of their stares on his back as he entered the unit. At the far end of the hallway, Porter Hayden sat in a chair just in front of the windows, legs crossed and his attention wholly on the book he held. Marella was leaning over the nurse's station, smiling easily and speaking animatedly to the woman on duty.

When the alarms went off, seconds after a loud crash, his immediate reaction was to turn halfway, keeping his back up against the corridor wall, to prepare himself for the manhandling he was expecting from Security, but as he turned he could see that the doors were shut. The guards were still on the other side of the doors though one now peered through the small window. The sudden flurry of motion from the nurse's station as the nurse and Marella broke into something nearing a run, and the soft, plaintive, "Michael," from his companion drew his attention away from the ICU entrance and back towards the rooms. He was half her age and his legs were longer but Mrs. Hayden beat him to the opened doorway by almost a full stride.

He was expecting a crisis, a crash cart, some frantic medical procedure already underway somehow in the mere heartbeats that it had taken him to travel thirty feet of hallway. There was chaos, but mostly caused by the sudden entry of five people into the room, and the crushing panic abated almost immediately when he saw Briggs, conscious, aware and very much alive, pressing his right hand against his left shoulder and speaking with what looked like controlled anger to Marella.

Hawke bent to help the nurse right the overturned piece of monitoring equipment that appeared to be the source of the alarm. He strained through the shrill cacophony to pick out what Briggs was saying. Finally the nurse did something and the noise abruptly ceased.

"… syringe," Briggs was saying, breathlessly. "Eric … pocket after."

Marella stepped back to let the nurse have access to Briggs. Both women were sending sweeping glances around the room, at the monitors and at the patient, as if looking for something missing, or perhaps trying to identify an item that shouldn't be there. She circled to the other side of the bed, bent down and picked up something small, something that was attached to a long cable: the call button for the nurse. It had been on the floor, out of Briggs' reach. Hawke looked again at the upended blood pressure monitor, saw the shredded end of tubing that had once been attached to it, and understood.

"Who's Eric?"

"Eric Schiller." Marella answered, fingering the call button and looking as if she might be physically ill. She looked up at Hawke. "His code name is Laban."

That was all Hawke needed and he jostled the Haydens in his hurry to get around them and out the door. One of the Security guards was standing inside the entrance doors to ICU, hand on his gun, and frustrated, Hawke slowed his pace and stopped instead of charging past.

He heard a noise, turned and saw Marella emerge from Briggs' room. She held one hand to her head, as if massaging a sudden unexpected headache and wore a look of such disorientation that Hawke felt a brief moment of concern, quickly squashed by his urgency to move.

"Find Laban. We need to find out what was in that syringe." She turned her attention on the guard and snapped with sudden fierceness. "Let him go, and put out an alert for Laban. Priority One, my authorization."

The guard hesitated, but Hawke was through the door and heading for the stairs. They were faster than the elevators and Laban had several minutes head start already. Using the railings, he half slid, half jumped down the three flights of stairs. There were easily a dozen people or more in the lobby and Hawke was grateful that Laban's fair hair made it easy to exclude everyone he saw. He skidded to a halt at the receptionist's desk. Phone to one ear, the young woman was already on edge but the look she sent Hawke was reassuring in its focus.

"Out the front exit. Maybe two minutes ahead of you."

He nodded his thanks, grateful for the efficiency of Marella or the guards upstairs or whomever had passed on the alert so quickly, and jogged towards and then out the main doors of the clinic. The Clinic was built on a small hill and its parking lots, to the right and left of the entrance, were set just a bit lower than the building itself. Hawke quickly ran his gaze over the vehicles in the lot to his left, looking for blond hair, a moving car, lit taillights, anything that indicated someone who was on the move. He rapidly sorted through the handful of cars in motion, rejecting each as the drivers proved to be too old, too young, dark haired, gray haired or women. He looked for the white limousine without success and turned his attention to the right parking lot just as a blond haired man stepped out from the shadow of a van and crossed from one strip of parking spaces to another. Hawke broke into a run.

He hit Laban in a low tackle just as the other man reached for the handle of a dark blue sedan. They hit the ground together and Hawke felt the full force of the ground's impact, knocking the air from his lungs, and he rolled away from Laban for a second to recover. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Laban scrambling to his feet. He lunged upward from the ground, driving Laban into the car door with a shoulder into Laban's lower back.

"You son of a bitch."

Laban snaked an arm around Hawke's throat and pulled back and upward, until Hawke drove an elbow into his stomach. The two men grappled, fought for a handhold that would give an edge and Hawke heard the sound of cloth tearing, not sure whether it was his clothes or Laban's. He drove his foot into Laban's left instep and then slammed his body into the other man, snapping the blond head against the car window.

"What was in the syringe?"

In the distance, he heard shouts and the sound of running feet. He drew a hand away from Laban to wipe the blood that was streaming from his own nose, not terribly aware of how or when he'd taken the blow, and Laban took advantage, surging into him, shoving Hawke's upper body as his foot hooked around Hawke's ankle. Unbalanced, Hawke staggered into the side of the pickup truck parked in the next space, lost his fight with gravity and spun to the ground. He half-rolled to turn back to Laban just as the other man's hand emerged from under his suit jacket, gripping a silver-jacketed automatic.

Breaths coming hard and somewhat painfully, Hawke stared at the gun for a second before his face contorted into an expression of incredulity.

"Are you out of your goddamn…"

His eyes widened during the sub second period of time it took for the gun's trigger to be pulled and he twisted desperately, uselessly, into hard macadam for find cover that just wasn't there. He felt the impact, left side, mid-rib cage, towards the outside and thought for a second, _that wasn't as bad as I'd expected_. Then breathing became something that didn't seem autonomic and he felt the burning heat of a bullet that had been spinning in a tight spiral at a velocity of more than 300 feet per second when it hit him. The friction fire seemed to permeate his entire left side and Hawke gaped for air.

"Drop it! Drop the gun!"

Hawke heard the voice but was trying very hard not to throw up or pass out and it wasn't until he'd managed to suck in another two breaths that he recognized it as Marella.

"Do it now!"

He turned his head against the ground at an angle to watch Marella and Laban face off. She stood in a perfect firing range stance, both hands gripping a gun that was aimed with rock steady hands at Laban's head.

"Marella, _he_ attacked _me_," Laban said in a voice that sounded eminently reasonable even as it emerged between shaky breaths. "And after what he did this morning, I think it's entirely possibly that he's snapped. Call Security."

She didn't move, kept her eyes fixed on his face, watching him intently.

"What was in the syringe, Eric?"

Laban blinked, studied her for a second and then shook his head.

"I don't know what you're…"

"What was in the goddamn syringe?"

"What syringe?" Laban turned his head, looked at Hawke. "What did he tell you? He's not in his right mind, Marella. Have you heard what he did to Airwolf this morning?"

She fired.

Hawke started at the sudden, unexpected noise and Laban's shout of pain and anger as he clutched his right arm. His right hand spasmed, the gun spun out of his grip and clattered to the ground and Hawke really and truly wished he had the ability to reach for it. Moving even an inch or two seemed far outside the realm of possibility.

"You think I'm kidding?" Marella said softly, stepping closer to the two men. "You think I won't shoot you again and then search your body until I find that syringe?"

Laban stared at her, physically trembling from pain and shock or from fury, possibly both.

"You're out of line. Consider yourself suspended, pending charges." Laban clenched his teeth. "Put the gun down now and you might avoid spending the rest of your life in jail."

Hawke heard the approaching footfalls and thought, _it's about fucking time_. He lay his head back on the ground and though he was desperate to close his eyes, he wouldn't dare do so until this played out.

"Search him," Marella barked.

Hawke was grateful the two men who'd joined them had the decency to step carefully around him. One stooped and slid a pen through the trigger guard on Laban's gun to lift it. The other pushed Laban carefully against the man's own car and quickly and professionally patted him down, one hand stopping and resting against the right hand suit jacket pocket. The man's hand lifted the pocket flap and slipped into it, emerging with a small, capped plastic syringe that he raised and displayed to Marella.

"What was in it?" she demanded, voice hoarse and just on the edge of control.

She and Laban stared at each other, eyes narrowed.

"We're going to test it and find out anyway," she coaxed. "You tell us now and he lives, it will go better for you. You know that."

Laban bit at his lip and then finally nodded.

"Potassium."

Hawke blinked. So did Marella.

"You _bastard_!"

She turned to the Security team that was arriving.

"Give me a radio. Now." She pointed at Laban. "Handcuff him and hold him in a secure place. No one gets in to see him unless I say so." Then she activated the radio. "I need a gurney and a medical team out here right away. Parking lot A, third row. Now connect me to ICU."

Hawke heard her speaking urgently as she walked away and just before he gave into the welcoming darkness, he wondered when potassium had become the weapon of choice.


	21. Chapter 21

Chapter Twenty-One - Conclusion

* * *

He was still settling in his wheelchair, pulling the robe's belt ties from under his legs, when they suddenly stopped moving. Looking up, he could hardly argue with Marella's decision. It was always best to make nice with the boss's family and in her case, the people who might possibly one day be her in-laws and Marella was no fool; she showed the proper level of deference and affection to Archangel's mother. Hawke didn't mind either; there was something in Elisabeth Hayden's smile that was reassuring and calming, enough that it almost made up for the humiliation of meeting them in his pajamas and robe. It'd been so many years since Hawke's mother died that he'd almost forgotten what it felt like to bask in maternal warmth.

Mesmerized by bright blue eyes and wispy, white hair clipped stylishly short into loose curls, Hawke felt his left hand gathered into a delicate two-handed clasp, surrounded, encompassed by affection and gratitude. He blamed his pain meds for how slowly his brain was processing what was simply social interaction, his thoughts stumbling over each other. Mrs. Hayden smelled like powder and something sweet, yet not cloying.

"If I'd wondered how it was that you and Michael are friends, I wonder no more." Elisabeth Hayden's gaze was soft and affectionate, but her words were velvet over steel. Those who might harm her family did so at their own peril. "Thank you, Hawke. I am grateful beyond words. My son is extremely important to me."

Embarrassed, Hawke felt obligated to reply with an honesty that surprised him as much as it probably surprised Marella. "Michael's important to me, too."

Porter Hayden was gruffly grateful, a clap on Hawke's shoulder and a stiff nod. "Got yourself hurt in the bargain, I see. Michael's lucky to have such loyal friends." His brown eyes ranged over Hawke and briefly over Marella before returning to his wife. "We're heading back to the house. I think Elisabeth might have a nap and I could go for a dip in the pool. We'll be back later to visit with Michael."

Mrs. Hayden's hands were still wrapped around Hawke's. "You take care of yourself now, young man." Leaning forward, she placed a light kiss on Hawke's cheek. The blush was immediate and completely outside his control.

Marella hugged the other woman, exchanged a quick peck on the cheek with General Hayden. Watching the Haydens made their way out of the ICU, towards the building exit, Hawke shook his head, sensations still sluggish, mind a little blurry from the pain meds.

"What is it?"

"Nothing," Hawke said. At her raised eyebrow – she knew there was something there – he relented even if it was weird. "Is it me or does Hayden smell exactly like Michael?"

The way her jaw shifted to one side as she blew out a breath, frustration, annoyance, told Hawke he wasn't imagining things.

"Yes. He did," Marella said, wheeling Hawke towards Briggs' room. "He must have 'borrowed' Michael's aftershave. It was probably sometime after he polished off all of the bourbon, single malt, and rum in the house. Poor man will have to make do with whatever alcohol remains even if it's not top shelf."

"Parasite," Hawke muttered, drawing a laugh. "I didn't know Michael wore aftershave."

"Pretty much every day, except sometimes when he's not working," Marella replied. She sniffed a little, a delicate snort. "And not here, of course. Why? What of it?"

Hawke shrugged, reached up and rubbed his shoulder where Hayden's friendly clap had awoken bruises that had been previously quiet. "Most aftershave smells like crap, like salesmen or politicians." Which, considering Archangel's chosen profession, almost fit, except that Briggs just smelled like…. Briggs. Which was to say, not like aftershave, just clean and something else that eluded Hawke.

"It's a custom blend."

That was surprising, and then again, it wasn't.

"Custom blend?" Hawke whistled, craning his head around to look up at her. Vanity, thy name is Michael. That would serve as rich material for a long time; Briggs would never hear the end of it.

She stopped the wheelchair just outside the door to Archangel's room and spun it, wheels squeaking in protest, so that Hawke faced her.

"I can't believe I'm asking this," she said, pushing her hair back away from her face with one hand as she gripped his wheelchair with the other, "and God knows, this is hardly your strong suit, but Michael's a little out of sorts and I'm hoping you can distract him because I don't think cheering up is in the cards."

Hawke rubbed his mouth, trying to hide his amusement at Marella's all too accurate assessment of his emotional influence. "He's pissed about Laban?"

Her hair bounced as she tilted her head, thinking about it. "Somewhat," she finally answered. "I think I'm a lot more angry about that than Michael is."

Hawke would bet she was. Laban's continued existence owed a great deal to Marella's disciplined professionalism. He'd no doubt she would have preferred to have emptied the entire clip into Laban for what he'd tried to do to Archangel. It was possible that only the need to 'debrief' Laban had kept the sorry son-of-a-bitch alive.

"You get anything out of him yet?"

Marella shook her head distractedly and Hawke wasn't sure whether the negation meant that they didn't get an answer from Laban or they didn't get an answer that could possibly explain what he'd tried to do.

"Why potassium?"

"The cardiac arrhythmia," she paused and took a steadying breath, "and the cardiac arrest that followed would have appeared to be an outcome of his kidneys difficulty processing potassium. Cause of death would probably have been deemed complications from acute renal failure."

Hawke thought about the call button for the nurse, deliberately moved out of Briggs' reach, while nearly everyone closest to Briggs was nearby but unaware he was in trouble. Laban might have gotten away with it.

"Sounds like he did some research," he ventured carefully.

Marella's attention snapped back to him. "As opposed to a panicked and desperate attempt to keep his job after you'd humiliated him in front of Zeus and half the Committee and then rigged Airwolf to explode, both within the same four to six hour window?"

Hawke swallowed. He'd already arrived at that realization.

"Yeah."

Her lips quirked and she nodded. "He'd obviously thought about it before that. I doubt he would have easily acquired the dosage he used in such a small window of time."

_But I was the catalyst; I gave him the excuse to use it_, Hawke thought.

"And of course, we both know that Laban only _thought_ he'd seen Airwolf destroyed."

Hawke studied her, and then blinked almost innocently. She laughed.

"Right. Well, getting back to the favor I'd asked. The doctors told Michael this morning that he's going to be on full bed rest for at least another six to eight weeks before the pelvic fracture is sufficiently healed to support any weight on it. And then crutches for weeks, possibly months after that, while he does physical rehabilitation for it and his leg."

Ouch. Two months flat on his back wasn't something Hawke would have taken all that well either. Adding rehabilitation to the equation at least doubled the length of the recovery period.

She acknowledged his wince. "It's not entirely a bad thing. It's going to take time to recover from some of the internal injuries." She sighed heavily. "That and additional treatment."

"I thought he was getting better," Hawke said, taken by surprise.

"He is," she said immediately, sinking to a squat by Hawke's chair and balancing her weight carefully on heels high enough to make Hawke nervous for her. "He's better than he was, but he's a long way from being healthy. I think he's just realizing how badly injured he was. Still is, really." She smiled ruefully.

"And you're sending _me_ to cheer him up?" Hawke's expression was just as incredulous as his voice.

Marella laughed softly. "It's counterintuitive, I know. Pick a fight, bait him a little, do whatever comes naturally between you two."

Five doctorates, Hawke reminded himself, one of which was in psychology, not to mention a medical degree, plus intimate knowledge of a man she loved and probably knew better than anyone else in the world. He still thought she was crazy and he grumbled as he wheeled himself to the door.

"Don't blame me if he gets worse."

Hawke pushed open the door, scowled at the still depressing quantity of monitors and tubing surrounding Briggs's bed. The man himself was horizontal, hospital bed angled just enough that Briggs didn't have to raise his head to interact with his doctors or visitors.

"Your stepfather's borrowing your aftershave," Hawke announced, wheeling himself slowly into the room.

"He's probably drinking it; I'm sure there's some amount of alcohol in there," Briggs said flatly, opening his eye and regarding Hawke with disbelief. "You look like hell. Who let you out of bed?"

"Dr. Duval," Hawke replied, positioning the wheelchair on Briggs' right. He wondered if the monitors and equipment were grouped on Briggs' left so that they wouldn't obstruct the patient's eyesight. "You still look like shit yourself."

"Marella doesn't have privileges at this hospital."

"You think that stops her, or stops the staff here from listening to her?" Hawke crooked an eyebrow.

Marella was senior enough in the Firm that she could throw her weight around the clinic, even before she had finished medical school and passed her boards. The inference that she had the full support of a Deputy Director only amplified her influence.

Briggs scowled and said nothing. He was drawn and obviously ill but there was actual color in his skin tone, nowhere near normal but enough to serve as a distinct contrast with the pallor he'd had when Hawke had last seen him. Someone had washed his hair and shaved him recently enough that Briggs might past for normal if he weren't in a hospital gown, in a hospital bed, and squinting without benefit of his distinctive glasses. And if normal included the oxygen tubing under his nose and the central line just below his collarbone.

"You look better than you did last time I saw you."

"I thought I looked like shit," Briggs said, expression softening with a smile and a trace of his normal humor.

"You do," Hawke said, unwilling to go into a detailed comparison. "Last week you looked like something Tet dug up."

"What's this I hear about you going to jail?"

Hawke coughed into his hand, a fake cough, trying to cover a sudden and unexpected surge of embarrassment.

"Thought I'd try working with you for a change."

Then he wondered if Briggs even remembered that line. Marella had said something about memory loss from the trauma.

"Sorry I missed the occasion," Briggs said, his tone that unique mixture of dry warmth that was patented Archangel. "Any chance of a repeat performance?"

"Maybe," Hawke grinned back at him. "It's kind of like Halley's Comet. Try again in about 75 years or so."

"Hmmmph. That's what I thought."

Hawke felt good, felt a surprisingly strong sense of well being considering the environment and the circumstances. He might go weeks or months without talking to Briggs, and usually complained when circumstances demanded that he do so. He hadn't even realized that the vague feeling of unease, the tension that had been living in the back of his neck for the last few weeks had anything to do with the thought he might never again toss words back and forth with the other man in the easy banter that they'd developed.

He rubbed the back of his neck, felt a little of the tension uncoil. "So, how you feeling, Michael?"

Briggs sighed, deflating a little. "Besides the fact that I'm tired of answering that question," he said with more than a hint of irritation, "I'm grateful to be alive and more or less in one piece." He glanced at his lower body. "Or at least reassembled."

Hawke raised a brow in patent disbelief. "Really?"

Briggs scowled. "I'm being fed through one tube, pissing into another and -- Christ, there's not really a good way to say this, alright, maybe there is -- excreting waste into a bag. I'm stuck in this goddamn bed for another six weeks and I can't move an inch or take a deep breath without _everything_ hurting. What do you think?"

"That about it?" Hawke said, after he'd caught his breath.

"Did I mention sleeping twenty hours out of every twenty-four?" Briggs grumbled. "Even when I'm awake, I'm tired. And the drugs are making me queasy."

Hawke bit back a smile. "Bitch, bitch, bitch."

Briggs said something under his breath in a language Hawke didn't recognize. He was sure it wasn't complimentary.

"You're getting nothing but sympathy from Marella, from your family, and from your entire staff. You're probably drowning in feminine concern while you're doing this stoic 'just glad to be alive' bullshit." Hawke smiled. "Am I glad you're alive? Hell, yes. Considering that you weren't expected to live, I think you're doing pretty damn good."

"Did you come here just to piss me off?"

"Nope," Hawke replied. Keeping his face straight was something of a strain. "Marella wanted me to cheer you up. Or at least distract you."

"Oh, God," Briggs said, his voice soft and despairing. "And she asked you to do it? Tell me you're joking." He grabbed at the hospital blanket with his right hand as if he considered pulling it over his head. A quick tug yielded only a corresponding wince and Briggs rested his right arm protectively over his midsection.

"How come you never mentioned you're related to Porter Hayden?"

"What is this? Twenty goddamn questions?" Briggs glared at Hawke, at the thin cotton blanket, the wave pattern on a monitor, and the room in general. "I'm not. His marriage to my mother doesn't construe a family relationship."

Hawke almost gave up then and let Briggs go back to sleep or glower at the walls or whatever the man wanted to do. Taking a deep breath, he pressed on.

"You know, Hayden was in Nam the same time I was there."

"I thought that might be the case." Briggs stared sullenly at the ceiling for a few minutes, and then finally dragged his attention back to his visitor with a sigh, manners or curiosity overriding his bad temper. "Did you know him then?"

"Knew of him," Hawke said, leaning back in his wheelchair and kicking the brake on with his hospital slippers. "He was a full bird then, before he got the star. Not a bad pilot or commander," he said, lying through his teeth.

"When he wasn't hitting the sauce," Briggs said, "and then he became something of a autocrat." He rolled his eye in Hawke's direction. "I read his OERs before he married my mother and I talked to people who flew for him."

Of course he had.

"OERs? Didn't know you spoke Army."

Briggs turned an indignant glare in Hawke's direction. "I did my two years like everyone else."

_This_ Hawke hadn't known and he knew his face showed his surprise.

"Not Nam," he protested.

"No." Briggs exhaled slowly. "Vietnam was still heating up in the early sixties. I spoke fluent German, passable Russian, and expressed a strong interest in Intel." He smiled. "So the Army decided I should learn to fly helicopters and then shipped me to Korea."

Hawke shook his head and clucked his tongue against the roof of his mouth.

"Michael, if the Army wanted you to have an Intelligence career, they would have assigned you an Intelligence career."

"Someone was paying attention. The Firm was waiting, offer in hand, when I got out."

"Which is how you got access to Hayden's OERs. Must piss him off that you have access to all that material. Not to mention a higher security clearance." Hawke grinned suddenly. "Not that you'd rub that in or anything."

Briggs tried to control the smirk that was fighting to come out, finally gained control by clearing his throat. "Tempting though it may be to do so, I restrain myself to maintain family harmony. My mother's husband may be overly fond of imbibing, Hawke, but he is good to my mother and he makes her happy." The grin hardened, so did the gaze. "And he knows that his own health and well-being are contingent upon her continued happiness."

"She's a great lady, Michael. I've no idea what she sees in Hayden, but if he makes her happy…" Hawke just shook his head, in amusement and mock-pity. "Did the poor bastard know what he was getting into with you when he married her?"

Briggs shrugged, winced as if even that small amount of movement was painful, and closed his eye. "I've no idea. It's possible he really did think I was in overseas investment, but I doubt it. He was still active duty and not without connections." He sighed. "Why are we talking about this, anyway?"

Hawke exhaled in frustration. Marella should have sent someone else if she wanted Briggs distracted, entertained or cheered up. Hawke wasn't all that good at doing any of those things, for himself or anyone else -- that was Dominic's job, or Caitlin's – and pissing off a man in pain wasn't his idea of helping the healing process.

"Still digesting the idea that you have a family," he said, tossing the conversational ball back to Briggs. "Outside the Firm, I mean. Any brothers or sisters?"

Briggs shifted his head and turned an icy blue glare on Hawke. "Why did Marella really send you in here?"

Hawke shifted a little uncomfortably. "I was asking about you and she said you were awake."

"You're a terrible liar, you know." The voice was gentle, almost friendly; the glare was not. "I suppose it's one of your better qualities, few as they are."

Considering that he lied, semi-professionally and very successfully for Archangel on a regular basis, Hawke wasn't quite sure how to take that.

"I _was_ asking about you and she said you were awake," Hawke insisted, getting a little annoyed. Briggs wasn't the only one injured and in pain.

"I'm fine, just a little tired."

It was a clear dismissal; Briggs was studying the white hospital blanket with sullen resentment, the fingers of his right hand worrying at a rough seam. Hawke recognized the signs of an impending brood, though he was usually the one brooding and if there was a magic trick to banishing them, he sure as hell didn't know the secret password. Mentally groaning, he went for the obvious.

"So, that mole in your organization worked for the Committee." Hawke paused for a beat, waiting for a reaction. "Someone you trusted?"

"Penetration agent," Briggs corrected almost automatically, without any real passion. "Mole is a term used in spy novels. I never said I trusted her." His attention returned to toying with the blanket.

"You don't trust anyone on the Committee, do you?" Hawke shook his head in disgust. "Even grunts in a foxhole trust the guys in there with them."

Briggs pulled away. Not physically because he was nearly immobile in the hospital bed, but everything in his gaze and his expression went distant, the door slamming shut behind him. In the veritable minefield that was Archangel's psyche, Hawke had stumbled upon a major tripwire. Gritting his teeth, he pulled it.

"You know, in a piranha feeding frenzy, they strip the flesh off their prey in minutes and they take bites out of each other while they're doing it. You work there." He paused for emphasis and to gather the rest of his thoughts. "I don't know why the hell you do it, or why anyone would fight tooth and nail to do it. I don't know why Laban would try to kill you to take your job, where you trust no one and you're constantly attacking or being attacked. It's a Hobbesian environment."

"Hyperbole doesn't suit you," Briggs said, politely calm in an unnerving way. "Understatement is more your forte. You may want to keep that in mind."

Pick a fight, bait him a little, Marella had said. Hawke took a deep breath and pulled the next tripwire.

"Laban was your friend, wasn't he?"

"He worked _for_ me," Briggs corrected.

Hawke couldn't resist.

"So does Marella and the two of you seem tighter than most married couples."

A single narrowed eye studied Hawke until Briggs finally blew a breath, frustration and concession. "Eric and I were friends at one point."

Hawke held back a smile; Briggs had ignored or dodged the Marella question yet again.

"Did you trust him?"

And was disappointed at the lack of reaction; Briggs had his shields in place and he was all cool disinterest.

"I trusted Laban within the parameters of certain situations."

Ah hell, Hawke wasn't all that good at trying to understand the types of sociopaths who'd kill a friend to advance a career and Briggs was talking this way too calmly.

"Did your situational trust include trusting him not to kill you?"

Hawke could see the color rising in Briggs' neck, saw his jaw clench, even heard his teeth grinding. And then it was all gone, as if it had never been there, blue eye a little darker or maybe it just looked that way from the way Briggs was squinting, studying Hawke as if he were a specimen.

"Marella sent you in here to pick a fight with me, didn't she?"

Hawke wasn't entirely sure how to respond; it was a little eerie to hear and see that level of control, emotion shut down abruptly and replaced by razor sharp analysis. The only emotion Hawke could read from Briggs now was satisfaction; Hawke's motive established and the source identified.

He shrugged. "Obviously there was no head trauma."

"Nothing serious."

"Just everything else," Hawke said.

"Not everything," Briggs said, exhaling softly. "Though it certainly feels that way."

"You work in a piranha tank, Michael."

Briggs growled somewhere deep in his throat. "Piranhas may be predators, but they are carnivorous, not cannibalistic."

"You know what I mean."

"I know that you are attempting to psychoanalyze me, which is without a doubt one of the single largest cases of irony yet recorded. The Department of Psychology at Stanford could study you for the rest of your life without running out of material. As could the NIMH."

"Yeah, but none of my friends have tried to kill me in the last week," Hawke said, and held up his hands anticipating the obvious response. "You're not in any shape to try, so don't." He watched Briggs for a second. "If you fall out of bed, I'll get my ass kicked by your girlfriend."

Briggs winced, whether in pain or from Hawke calling Marella his girlfriend, Hawke wasn't sure and he wasn't worried that Briggs would even try to get out of bed. The conversation overall and the current topic in particular were draining energy the man didn't have to spare; Hawke didn't remember seeing those faint purple shadows under Briggs' eyes when he first rolled in.

"I'm not going to try to explain my job or my choices to you, Hawke," Briggs said with strained patience. "And I'm not going to attempt to explain Eric's behavior because I don't wholly understand that myself. This isn't some daytime soap opera; there's not going to be an emotional catharsis or Come to Jesus moment triggered by you picking a fight with me, no matter what you or Marella might think."

Hawke felt a smile tug at the corner of his mouth and he let it show. Whatever Marella's motives were, he was pretty sure they were something a little more complex than sparking a cathartic moment.

"Okay, Michael. One last question. You have anyone in your life that you trust completely? Not situationally, but completely? Even one person?"

Briggs licked his lips, but if he was thinking the question over, it was a rapid decision. "Yes."

Hawke sighed, mostly with relief. "Okay then."

Briggs crooked an eyebrow. "Do you?"

"Yeah."

Briggs smiled, a weary smile in a face that had lost a little color since Hawke came in. "Glad to hear it. You going to let me sleep now?"

At the mere mention of sleep, Hawke was blindsided with an onset of exhaustion, born of blood loss, emotion and the gradual erosion of pain meds in his system. That he lingered was probably due to some perverse quality in his very nature.

"One last question: did they find the guys who shot down your helicopter? The last I heard from Marella sounded like the Firm knew who they are."

After a moment, he realized he was talking to himself. Briggs had slipped back into analgesic-flavored dreams and the sight of and sound of Briggs sleeping were a potent reminder to Hawke of his own desperate need to get back to bed.

"Or were," he amended, fully aware that those loyal to Archangel might have taken a more extreme methodology with the men who'd nearly killed him.

Hawke pushed at the wheels on his chair for a frustrating minute or two before remembering he'd engaged the brake. Annoyed, frustrated and definitely fading himself, he kicked if off and wheeled himself jerkily to the door.

"You look terrible," Marella said, with obvious concern as she rose from her chair in the hall and dropped the news weekly she'd been scanning.

"Some idiot doctor let me out of bed," Hawke agreed. "Think you can get me back to my room before I fall asleep?"

She had him halfway down the hall before he finished his request.

"How did it go?"

She still sounded worried but Hawke knew it wasn't all for him. Probably most of it wasn't for him. Sourly he wondered if any of the worry was for him.

"He's fine. He's cranky and uncomfortable and might be a worse patient than I am…"

"I'm not sure that's possible."

"… but he gave me crap about trying to psychoanalyze him or provoke him. Let him sulk, he'll get it out of his system and then he'll be fine."

Marella just hummed a bit as she steered him into his room, but she sounded a little happier.

"Let me help you," she insisted, kicking the brake on quickly as Hawke pushed himself up from the wheelchair.

He opened his mouth to argue, but the room began spinning and he felt himself start to sway before a steadying hand caught his arm, and another supported his back. Hawke would have been embarrassed how much he leaned on her if he wasn't so darn tired.

"I'm sorry," Marella said as she pulled the sheets and blankets back and eased him into the bed. "You're really not up for this yet. I wore you out and I know better."

Hawke groaned with pleasure as he sank into what now seemed like the most comfortable mattress he'd ever slept upon. Sleeping twenty hours out of twenty-four didn't sound like a bad thing at all; he wondered what the hell Archangel was complaining about.

"Yeah," he griped, "and you'd ask me to do it again in a heartbeat if you thought it would help Michael even a little."

He glanced up at her, pleased that she had the decency to look embarrassed.

"I probably would," she admitted as she gently laid the blanket back over Hawke and tucked the ends under the mattress "But that doesn't make it right."

Hawke smiled. He had just enough energy for a parting gift. "He's madly in love with you too."

She flushed right down to her roots and looked away until she regained her composure. "Thank you," she said, meeting his eyes with an earnest gaze. "I owe you, we owe you. For helping us identify our leak, for tracking down the bogus Airwolf and finding Zinn, for chasing after and stopping Laban." She bit at her lower lip. "For visiting with Michael just now. Thank you, Hawke. I won't forget it."

"Until the next Airwolf mission."

"That's business," she said emphatically. "This is personal and I mean it. I won't forget."

Find my brother, Hawke thought wearily, but there wasn't much point in mentioning it. From the size and thoroughness of the file he'd read, he knew Archangel was looking and if Archangel was looking, Marella was too. He wished there was something they could offer that he wanted, but he couldn't think of a thing he needed from the Firm, or from either of them individually.

Marella smiled and smoothed Hawke's hair back from his forehead with a gesture that was almost affectionate. "Get some sleep. I'll check on you later, see if you want me to smuggle in some non-hospital food."

He mustered a smile for her. Watching her leave, knowing she was heading back to Briggs, he thought with longing of Gabrielle and wondered what might have been, if Gabrielle would have sat with him in the hospital and looked at him the same way Marella looked at Briggs.

The way that Caitlin had looked at him when he woke up yesterday after the emergency surgery: a look of worried pride, anxiety and strength and fierce protectiveness all mixed together in an unwavering blue gaze, a look just for him.

The softness of the bed and the exhaustion he'd been fighting were pulling him into someplace warm and safe. Blue sky flying, late afternoon sun spilling over Eagle Lake, the quiet whisper of wind through pine trees and for the first time in a long time, something very much like hope.

* * *

Author's Notes

* * *

A/N: Once again, sincerest apologies for the significant gap in posting between Chapters 13 and the remaining 7 chapters of the story. Real life, that job thing, and a bit of a writer's block of how I got from Chapter 13 to the beginning of what turned out to be Chapter 20, the penultimate chapter that set up Chapter 21 delayed the story far longer than I'd ever thought.

For those who like the details as much as I do, Marella's 5 doctorates were mentioned in "Fallen Angel." They are Aeronautical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Psychology, Microbiology and French Literature. In the same scene she states that she has a year of classes remaining before she completes her Medical Degree. In another of my stories, ab ovo, I explained her disappearance from the series at the end of Season 2 as her completing the degree and then moving onto a job at Walter Reed.

**OER **= Officer Evaluation/Effectiveness Review

**NIMH** = National Institute of Mental Health


End file.
